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. . . and Bill shall lead US. 


“‘We must salute bur goddess 


y y y 






THE NEW 

SOPHOMORE 


BY 

JAMES SHELLEY HAMILTON 

AUTHOR OF “butt CHANLEE, FRESHMAN ” 



ILLUSTRATED 


D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 
NEW YORK AND LONDON: MCMIX 



tZ'T 




Copyright, 1909, by 
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY 


248444 


Published OctobeVt 1909 


• • 
• • • 




2.S// 


TO 

THE “BOYS OF ’o6” 

AND ALL OTHER GOOD AND TRUE 
FOLLOWERS OF 
SABRINA 




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FOREWORD 


Some ingenious person, I am told, has succeeded 
in ferreting out the place of which I thought 
“ Tresham ” was such a clever disguise, and no longer 
am I able to conceal the shortcomings of these 
attempts to picture certain phases of the life there 
under the protection of a fictitious name. So, al- 
though I still cling to that name out of gratitude 
for the security I once fancied it gave me, I have 
dropped all other subterfuge and boldly call some 
things as they are actually called by real people. 

But lest this story fall into the hands of some 
other ingenious person — and I am obtruding myself 
in this preface for his eye alone — I wish to say a 
word of warning. Let no one who may chance to 
read the following pages deceive himself with the 
idea that the key to any mystery is contained therein. 
Not a thing would I tell, for all the world, that 
might point the way to any holy of holies for a 
profane outsider, and anyone, no matter how in- 
genious, who imagines he can find a workable clue 
to the mystery of Sabrina will search for it in vain. 
Verhum sap. 


The Author. 













CONTENTS 


CHAPTER page 

I. — ^The Late Arrival i 

II. — Sizing Up ig 

III. — ^Trailing a Freshman 43 

IV. — The Outcome . . .66 

V. — Rural Adventure 97 

VI. — Freshman Burnet Writes a Theme . . . 120 

VII. — ‘‘Old Slouch’* on the War-path . . . .141 

VIII. — ^A Troublous Interlude 173 

IX. — ^The Banquet They Didn’t Have . . . 201 

X. — ^The Goddess Herself 233 

XI. — Flight and Pursuit 260 

XH. — ^The Finish 283 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 


“‘We must salute our goddess . . . and Bill shall lead 
us’’* . . . . . . . . Frontispiece 

“‘Freshmen hazin*? I never heard of such a thing!’” 

“He sprang back, screening the lantern with his coat ” 

“They came speeding on, desperately trying to improve 
every minute they had gained” 


FACING 

PAGE 

88 
1 66 

274 


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I 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


CHAPTER I 

THE LATE ARRIVAL 

ET Into It, freshman! What are you doing 



there?” 

Before he realized that he was the 


“ freshman ” meant, the fellow watching on the 
edge of the crowd found himself grabbed and sent 
whirling Into the thick of the rush. It was a mis- 
take : he was not a freshman at all. But there was 
no time to explain that It was the sophomore class 
he was planning to enter. He was straightway in 
the very heart of the fight, and because he had been 
eager to take a hand In it anyway, there he remained, 
forgetful of everything but the excitement of battle, 
until time was called and he was forcibly made to 
release a wriggly little fellow whom he had managed 
to get down and sit upon. 

The two of them got to their feet together, the 
little fellow red and ruffled, the new sophomore 
grinning broadly. He could not help It, the other 
looked so like an angry little fighting cock. 


I 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“What’s your name?” demanded the little fel- 
low. 

“ Bill,” answered the new sophomore, still 
grinning. 

“ Your last name? ” The little fellow evidently 
resented being sat upon, and he spoke sharply. 

“ My last name’s Bill.” 

The other looked at him, scowling, as if he was 
trying to decide whether he were being trifled with 
or not, and then turned away. Several upperclass- 
men who were standing about laughed. 

“ You’ll have to get after him. Butt,” one of 
them called after him. “ That’s the president of 
the sophomore class you’ve been trying to jolly, Mr. 
Bill,” he added, for he also was making the mistake 
of taking the new man for a freshman, and it is the 
privilege of juniors to correct freshmen when they 
seem to need it. 

“ Oh, thank you,” said the new sophomore, and 
he, too, walked away. He seemed to be a very 
fresh freshman indeed. 

Their mistake was not unnatural, for it was 
the first time any of them had ever seen him. He 
had arrived in town quite late the evening before, 
very weary and ready to crawl straight into bed, 
and that morning he had overslept, so that when he 
started for chapel he was serenely ignorant that 
the chapel exercises, though held late that first day, 
2 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


were already nearly half over and college had begun 
without him. 

So instead of morning prayers he had arrived 
upon a scene of tumult which past experience im- 
mediately told him was a rush. A coatless mob was 
apparently struggling for possession of the front 
steps, while another mob — not coatless and there- 
fore, he argued, upperclassmen — stood about and 
urged on the conflict. He had been mingling with 
the coated ones, wishing that he knew freshmen 
from sophomores so he could get into it, too, when 
some junior unceremoniously changed him from spec- 
tator to participant and fight he must, anyway, with 
no thought of which side was which. 

After his little episode with “ Butt ” he walked 
away, amused at the idea of that little fellow’s “ get- 
ting after him.” His principal feeling, however, 
was that he was really a Tresham man now, and 
he knew at least the nickname of one of his class- 
mates. He would get acquainted with more of them 
presently, but in the meantime there were other 
things to attend to. 

He had never been in Tresham before, but he 
had as accurate an idea of the college grounds as 
one can get from the map that then adorned the 
front page of the college catalogue, and he easily 
found his way to Langton Hall, presented his papers 
from the mid-western college where he had spent 
3 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


the year before, and was thereupon enrolled a mem- 
ber of the sophomore class — the class of Noughty- 
Even. He also looked up the courses he would 
have to take, but that was merely to find out what 
was ahead of him. He had no Intention of starting 
work on lessons until he had found a room to live In. 

He finally decided upon an uninteresting looking 
house not far from the campus, where an uninterest- 
ing looking woman assured him several times that 
she had no room to rent — she wouldn’t have students 
around the place anyway — and ended by giving him 
a big chamber looking out on the western hills, the 
like of which he could not have happened upon again 
if he had hunted a week. 

“ But you’ve got to understand one thing, young 
man,” she declared. “ I don’t like students — I never 
did, and for the life of me I don’t know why I’m 
takin’ you In this way, and you a perfect stranger 
and all that. But the minute you start any monkey 
shines, out you go, bag and baggage, and that’s flat.” 

He agreed that flat It was, and the bargain was 
closed. By supper time he had harassed an ex- 
pressman into bringing his trunk and boxes, 
wheedled a storekeeper Into delivering some new 
furniture on the same day It was ordered, and got 
himself completely and comfortably settled. Mrs. 
Sleeper came up when all was done to look at the 
result. 


4 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


“ It won’t last,” she declared. “ It looks real 
nice, but it won’t last. I never knew the man yet 
’t could keep things looking decent, much less a 
boy. You’d ought to shift that chair around so’s’t 
the light’ll fall over your left shoulder.” 

He obligingly shifted the chair, then after she 
had gone decided he liked it better the other way 
and shifted it back again. Then he went up to the 
hotel for supper. 

Altogether it had been a pretty good day. He 
was housed quite to his satisfaction, and now he 
could look around and begin to get acquainted. The 
little taste of action he had got in the chapel rush 
rather whetted his appetite, and he decided to look 
up some of his new classmates later in the evening 
and see if there wasn’t something going on. They 
would probably be visiting freshmen, and that might 
prove interesting. He wondered what sort of haz- 
ing they did at Tresham. 

It was still daylight when he left the hotel and 
strolled across the common. There were plenty of 
fellows about, and he was wondering whether he 
hadn’t better introduce himself to some of them 
when he saw a group of three coming straight for 
him — the little sophomore he had sat upon earlier 
in the day between two others who towered over 
him like giants. They stopped in front of him and 
the little fellow spoke. 

2 


S 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Where is your room? ” he demanded. 

It was rather unceremonious, but he remembered 
that it was not the first time that day he had been 
taken for a freshman. Well, he didn’t mind — the 
joke was really on the others. 

“ At Mrs. Sleeper’s,” he answered, just the flick- 
er of a smile touching the corner of his mouth. 

“ Be in your room at half past seven,” was the 
curt command and the three moved on. 

The same three presented themselves at Mrs. 
Sleeper’s front door at the appointed hour and were 
met there by Mrs. Sleeper herself. She did not 
know that her visitors included not only President 
Chanler of the sophomore class, but “ Bull ” Dur- 
ham and “ Husky ” Hawkins, two of the greatest 
heroes then engaged in accumulating glory for the 
Tresham football team. It would not have mat- 
tered, probably, if she had. 

“ If you mean Mr. Bill, he’s upstairs,” she said 
in answer to their query if there were a freshman 
living there. “ And if you’re friends of his it’s all 
right. But you aren’t coming in unless he wants to 
see you. I’m not going to have any of this hazing 
business going on in my house.” 

“ I think he’ll come down and see us — we have 
an appointment with him. Would you mind telling 
him Mr. Chanler is waiting for him? ” 

The new sophomore came down immediately. 

6 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 

“ I’m sorry I can’t invite you in,” he remarked, 
“ but Mrs. Sleeper doesn’t like your looks. She 
feels sure you want to haze me.” 

It was quite dark now, but he knew the three 
exchanged looks of amazement. 

“ We’re going up to the Dorms,” said Chanler 
shortly, and started to lead the way. 

“ Do you — excuse me, but am I invited, too? ” 

“ Invited ! ” exclaimed Hawkins, the biggest of 
the trio, and his voice rolled out in a huge growl. 
“ What do you think this is — a tea party? We’re 
going to take you up to the Dorms to haze you — 
that’s the kind of a party it is. Step along, now.” 

“ Just a minute till I get my hat — ” and the 
new sophomore was in the house, and flying up the 
stairs before they could stop him. 

Durham — the fat one — laughed. “ He’s a case 
for you. Butt,” he chuckled. “ Is he just plain, 
ordinary fresh, or what?” 

The new sophomore was back, wearing a felt 
hat, before Chanler had time to answer, and himself 
started to lead the way to the campus. The others 
fell in behind him, stricken silent by sheer surprise. 

“ How do you manage the hazing?” he inquired 
politely. “ Do you take them individually or col- 
lectively? ” 

“ You’ll see when we get there.” Chanler meant 
to be impressive, but he succeeded only in being curt. 
7 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


It is hard to be impressive to a fellow who has 
had you on the ground and sat on you — especially 
when you feel pretty sure he is chuckling to himself 
at the memory of it. “ Did you know,” he went 
on after they had climbed the campus hill in silence 
for a moment, “ that the freshmen all wear caps 
here — little black caps? ” 

“ No, do they? ” Hawkins scowled and Durham 
grinned at the tone, just bordering on freshness, but 
not near enough to be unmistakably intentional. “ I 
should think their ears would be cold In the winter. 
You have pretty cold winters here, haven’t you?” 

He received no answer. They had reached the 
first dormitory by this time, and Chanler led the 
way Into a room on the ground floor. A small crowd 
of sophomores were sitting about In a circle wherein 
stood two very nervous freshmen. 

Here he Is,” announced Chanler, and the new 
sophomore was pushed, none too politely. Into the 
middle of the room. He removed his hat and made 
a calm survey of the little circle. Hawkins had taken 
his stand In front of the fireplace, leaning one el- 
bow on the mantel. He fixed his man with a stern 
gaze. 

“ What’s your name? ” he questioned gruffly. 

The new sophomore returned his look with an 
eye that twinkled just the tiniest bit. “ Bill,” he 
answered. 


8 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


“Any relation to Buffalo Bill?” called out a 
voice from the corner. 

“ Not that I ever heard of,” answered Bill se- 
renely, his eyes still on Hawkins. 

“ What’s your whole name? ” Hawkins went on, 
scowling. 

“ Ridgeway Bill, Jr.” 

“ When did you get into town? ” 

“ Last night on the half past ten trolley from 
Southboro. I came from Omaha, Neb., where I was 
born eighteen years ago the twenty-second day of 
last June. My father ” 

“ You can cut out the family history,” inter- 
rupted Hawkins. He had an uneasy suspicion that 
under his eager politeness Bill was taking things en- 
tirely too much as a joke. “ If you don’t happen to 
know it you are up here to entertain us. The gentle- 
men here assembled are members of the class of 
Noughty-Even, and you should look upon being 
allowed to entertain them as a privilege and an 
honor.” 

Bill inclined his head. 

“ I appreciate the privilege — and the honor,” 
he said quietly. “What can I do for you? I shall 
be happy to try anything you suggest.” 

It sounded meek enough. Hawkins stared at 
him almost in surprise and then turned to Chanler. 

“ What’ll he do. Butt?” he asked. 

9 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Chanler had perched on the edge of the desk, 
where he sat watching Bill with a suspicious glint in 
his eyes. 

“ Perhaps he’d better suggest something him- 
self,” he replied. “ It will be a good test of his 
taste — we hope he has good taste.” 

“ I could sing a song for you.” Bill spoke hesi- 
tatingly, with a downward look that surely meant 
modesty. 

“ Go ahead, then,” commanded Hawkins shortly. 

“ I could do much better if I had some sort of 
an instrument — ^you haven’t got a piano or an organ 
around, have you? — or a tambourine- ” 

“ No, we haven’t I Go on and do your singing.” 

“ It’s a duet I’m going to sing, a duet for so- 
prano and tenor. Of course I can’t do both parts at 
once, both at the same time, but, perhaps — I am sure 
you can fill in the one I’m not singing with your 
imagination. It really is a very lovely song, but I 
wish I had an instrument. Are you sure there isn’t 
a piano hidden away somewhere?” He peered 
in the direction of the closet door, which stood 
ajar. 

Hawkins’s face was very red and he shot a 
wrathful glance at Durham, who lay giggling fool- 
ishly on the window seat. 

“ Cut that!” he growled. “ If you’re going to 
sing, sing!” 

lO 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


Bill gave him a reproachful look, then drew him- 
self suddenly erect, hands clasped tightly in front of 
him, eyes raised to the ceiling, and began. 

Oh, that we two were Maying, 

Down the stream of the soft spring breeze ! 

Like children, with violets playing. 

In the shade ” 

At the first note everybody let out a gasp. It 
Was horrible — ^weirder singing they had never heard, 
and the worst of it was, the singer seemed to think 
he was making sounds of matchless beauty. Then 
Durham turned his face to the wall and laughed 
till he choked, Chanler averted his head and the 
others tittered. A rapt smile came to Bill’s face, 
and he sang on, his eyes fixed in an ardent gaze on 
an upper corner of the room. Hawkins glared. For 
the life of him he could not make out whether Bill 
was only acting like a conceited fool or really was 
one. The two freshmen had drawn back against 
the wall, uncertain whether to laugh or be sorry 
for their classmate. 

Then Bill shifted to the soprano part, his voice 
rising in a tremulous, passionate falsetto. In the 
midst of it the hall door opened and three more 
freshmen were “ shooed ” into the room by a tall 
and freckled sophomore who stopped aghast at the 
sight and sound that greeted him. “ That’s McCar- 
II 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


thy, the pitcher,” whispered one of the freshmen 
behind Bill. 

Hawkins suddenly made up his mind. 

“Stop it!” he yelled above the screeching of 
Bill’s song. Bill stopped, a look of hurt surprise 
on his face. McCarthy stepped forward and looked 
him over. 

“ What’s the matter with him? ” he asked. 

“ Mac! ” Chanler touched the newcomer on the 
arm and drew him back to the window seat, while 
Hawkins addressed himself to telling Bill what he 
thought of fresh freshmen. “ That’s Freshman 
Bill,” Chanler whispered, chuckling, “ and he is 
fresh. But it was too good to stop. Husky didn’t 
know whether he was putting it on or not, and it 
was such a circus watching him trying to make out 
whether he was being kidded. We’ll have to give 
this Bill fellow a special session afterwards.” 

“Me for him!” McCarthy turned to resume 
his Inspection of Bill, who was looking serenely Into 
Hawkins’s angry face. “ Come on, you! ” He beck- 
oned to the three freshmen he had brought In with 
him. “ Step forward and show the gentlemen what 
you’re good for. You can fade away for the pres- 
ent,” he added to Bill. “ Fade back Into that comer 
there.” 

Bill looked at him with Interest as he stepped Into 
the corner Indicated. McCarthy took hold of things 


12 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


with a master hand and the three freshmen were 
put through a series of stunts that kept the room in 
an uproar. But presently the interest in them began 
to wane and McCarthy dismissed them. 

“ Trot along home to bed, now,” he commanded. 
They were glad enough to obey and hurried out of 
the room in short order. “ Now let’s have a look 
at Freshman Bill.” 

But “ Freshman ” Bill was nowhere to be seen. 
While everybody’s interest was centered in McCar- 
thy and his doings, he had quietly walked out of the 
room, as one of the freshmen stationed against the 
wall testified. 

The outraged sophomores stared at one another. 
Such arrogance was inconceivable — insufferable. The 
way he had borne himself toward tiawkins was bad 
enough — they realized now they had made a mis- 
take in treating it lightly at the time, though they 
had meant to punish him for it later. But now — 
The two freshmen who were still in the room were 
heartily thankful not to be in Bill’s shoes. 

“ If he’s in his room I’ll get him,” said Hawkins 
grimly and slammed out into the hall. 

He wasn’t in his room. 

** I don’t believe it’s any of your business where 
he is, but he isn’t here,” Mrs. Sleeper declared, eye- 
ing Hawkins suspiciously. “ I should think you’d 
know — he went out with you.” 

13 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Hawkins had to take her word for it and go 
back empty-handed, hoping they had found him 
hiding in some other freshman’s room. But the 
hope was vain. No one had seen “ Freshman ” Bill. 

“ That landlady of his has got him hidden some- 
where,” Hawkins grumbled. “ I know it from 
the way she looked at me. But wait till to-mor- 
row I” 

In the meantime others had to bear the brunt 
of his wrath. In his ordinary frame of mind Haw- 
kins would have hung around looking on at the 
hazing for a little while and then gone home to bed, 
finding the whole thing too much trouble for the 
little fun there was in it. But with the thought of 
Bill to goad him on, he won that night the reputation 
of being a terror and a scourge. Freshmen quailed 
before him, and even the sophomores who were fol- 
lowing in his wake saw things that made them open 
their eyes. 

Chanler, as sophomore president, felt officially 
responsible for seeing that all freshmen were prop- 
erly visited, and his frequent tours of inspection gave 
him other things to think of than Ridgeway Bill, Jr. 
Bill would get what was coming to him in good 
time, he felt, and there was no use in getting excited 
over his disappearance now. He couldn’t stay in 
hiding forever. Besides, Chanler had taken rather 
a fancy to the supposed freshman. The way he had 

14 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


played with Hawkins had made fun enough to coun- 
teract its freshness. 

It was close upon ten o’clock, and Chanler had 
about decided that it was time to pass along the “ Cut 
it out for to-night ” signal when he bethought him 
of a certain freshman named Burnet whom he had 
not seen that evening. Burnet had come from Chan- 
ler’s home town and was pledged to Chanler’s fra- 
ternity. He roomed on the top floor of South 
College and thither Chanler repaired — to make sure 
Burnet had got his, he told himself. He found 
Burnet’s door locked and strange noises issuing from 
within. 

Open up. Freshman! ” he called, rattling the 
•door knob. 

“ Who is it? ” a voice answered, a voice he did 
not recognize. 

“ No matter who it is. Open up!” 

The door was not opened and the strange noises 
continued. Chanler rapped sharply. 

“ Open upL” he repeated. “ This is Chanler! ” 

The key turned in the lock and Burnet himself 
opened the door. Chanler entered and stopped with 
a gasp. Five freshmen were sprawled on the floor 
in various queer attitudes, emitting the strange noises 
he had heard and which they did not interrupt on 
his entrance. Seated on a table between the two 
windows, his coat off, his felt hat pushed far back 

15 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

on his forehead, was Ridgeway Bill, Jr., of Omaha, 
Neb., apparently engaged in hazing some of his own 
classmates. 

“ Come in,” he said, smiling genially. “ This — 
this thing we have before us is a freshman automo- 
bile. Freshman A, there — it’s a lot easier to call 
them by letters — is the headlight. Freshman B is the 
steering wheel. Freshman C is the crank ” 

“ If you haven’t the biggest nerve! ” Chanler 
had recovered his voice and he stepped forward with 
wrath in his eye. “ What do you ” 

“ Freshman D is the tonneau,” went on Bill with 
increasing enthusiasm, “ and Freshman E — , our 
host,” indicating Burnet, who was running wildly 
and aimlessly about the room, “ is the smell. Don’t 
you think it’s a rather good idea?” 

“ I think ” Chanler stopped to find adequate 

words. A freshman hazing his own classmates was 
not a thing to be dealt with lightly. 

“ Shut the thing off,” Bill directed quietly. The 
various noises ceased. “ All but the smell,” he 
added. “ Freshman E, you’ll have to smell a little 
while longer, till you vanish into thin air. You 
might begin vanishing right away, however, and 
hurry it up.” 

Burnet gradually ceased his wild maneuvers and 
at length disappeared into the closet. “ That is 
Freshman E’s own idea of what a smell acts like,” 

i6 


THE LATE ARRIVAL 


Bill went on. “ I don’t know whether it’s a good 
one or not. I never saw a smell before, but prob- 
ably ” 

“Well!” It was the only exclamation that 
Chanler could think of, but it served to stem Bill’s 
serene flow of words. 

‘‘ Well? ” Bill echoed inquiringly, getting down 
from the table. 

Chanler faced him, flushed with indignation. 

“ I don’t know what kind of an idea you have 
about college, or the way freshmen are expected to 

act. But whatever it is ” He stopped abruptly, 

staring. 

“ Well? ” Bill repeated. 

Chanler continued to stare and stepped nearer, 
unconsciously pointing to a pin fastened to Bill’s 
shirt. 

“ Isn’t — isn’t that a Kappa Chi pin? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“Are you — but aren’t you a freshman? Are 
you a Kappa Chi? ” 

“ Yes — Beta, Noughty-Even.” 

Chanler was too astonished to speak. Slowly he 
put out his hand. Bill met it with the Kappa Chi 
grip, arid a broad grin spread over both their faces. 

“ Then you’re going to be in my class ! ” Chan- 
ler exclaimed. 

“ Sure! You all took me for a freshman and 

17 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

I thought I’d let you think so for a while — it wasn’t 
bad fun ” 

The stamping of feet in the hallway, pausing 
just outside the door, interrupted him. The door 
opened and a band of sophomores entered, led by 
McCarthy and Hawkins, still on the warpath. Dur- 
ham followed immediately behind. They stood still 
in amazement at the sight of Bill and Chanler, still 
with hands clasped. 

“ Here’s your man, Husky,” said Chanler, turn- 
ing to them with a beaming smile. “ We made a 
mistake; He’s in our class — a new man. Come 
here — I want to introduce you. Brother Bill — 
Brother Hawkins.” 

Hawkins’s grim face slowly softened and broke 
into a grin. 

“By Golly!” he exclaimed, as he seized Bill’s 
hand in a grip that threatened to crush it. “ I was 
going to haze the life out of you! Do you know 
you’re about the freshest sophomore that ever struck 
this place?” 


CHAPTER II 


SIZING UP 

T hey straightway took their new classmate 
down to the house — to Chanler, Durham, 
and Hawkins there was only one “ the ” 
house — and the brethren of Kappa Chi gave him a 
reception that was all the heartier for coming a day 
late. 

“ You ought to have come right down here last 
night,” Chanler protested. “ Nobody ever goes to 
the hotel if there’s anywhere else to go, and you 
know this house is your home.” 

“ I know — but I was dead to the world when 
I got in, and the only thing I could think of was 
bed. Besides, I’d have missed being hazed, if I 
had, and it isn’t everybody that can have that two 
years running.” 

They made a long evening of it, sitting about a 
huge fire and talking until the chapel clock was strik- 
ing well into the small hours. When Bill finally 
got up and insisted upon going to his own room he 
knew that he liked Tresham and liked it well. The 
19 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


welcome he had been given warmed him to the 
heart, and the sophomores especially had received 
him into their little group in a thorough-going 
fashion that made him feel at home already. 

The next morning Mrs. Sleeper had to submit 
to a small-sized reception in his room which de- 
scended upon her like an invasion while she was 
sweeping and putting things to rights. They came 
trooping up the stairs without stopping to ring the 
front door bell — Chanler, Hawkins, Durham, and 
another Kappa Chi sophomore named Gray — and 
with a cheery “ Good-morning ” calmly took posses- 
sion of the room. Bill was not yet back from chapel 
and Mrs. Sleeper eyed the invaders with suspicion. 

“ Bill will be right down,” Chanler announced, 
“ and he told us to come right up.” 

Mrs. Sleeper made no reply, but gathered up 
her dust-pan and broom and departed, leaving the 
visitors to look about them. It w’as an ordinary 
enough room, without very much to distinguish its 
owner from any one of a hundred other Tresham 
sophomores. A mandolin on the couch may or may 
not have meant that he was musical — remembering 
the way he had slaughtered “ Oh, that we two were 
Maying I ” the night before they were inclined to be 
skeptical — and the large number of books seemed 
to indicate that he was fond of reading. On the 
mantel were two or three athletic trophies — a silver 
20 


SIZING UP 


cup, won, according to its inscription, in a diving 
contest, and a couple of others that were prizes in 
some track meet. A tennis racket and a bag of 
golf sticks stood in a corner. 

“Will you look at this!” exclaimed Gray, who 
was inspecting the bookcase. “ Brother Billiam must 
be a regular specialist in detective stories. Look at 
what he’s got lined up here — a whole shelf full of 
them — everything from Nick Carter and Old Sleuth 
to Sherlock Holmes.” 

“ It isn’t a bad collection, is it? ” They looked 
up and discovered Bill grinning in the doorway. “ I 
hope you don’t think they’re just trash — of course 
some of them are, but just because they’re detective 
stories I mean. I’ve got a whole stack of paper- 
covered ones at home that I couldn’t bring along, 
but there’s the cream of ’em right there. I picked 
up a new one the other day that’s pretty good. Ever 
read this? ” He went to the shelf and took out a 
red-covered volume. “ It’s by a new man, but he’s 
got a fellow here that I’d put up against Sherlock 
Holmes any day,” he began enthusiastically, and 
then stopped, laughing. “ I’ve been nutty over these 
things ever since I was a kid,” he explained, “ and 
I don’t suppose I’ll ever think there’s anything 
quite so fine as being a detective. Anyway, I’m 
like that old fellow in Davis’s ‘ In the Fog ’ — you 
get me listening to something where there’s a 
21 


>3 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

mystery to be cleared up and you can keep me up 
all night.” 

“ I was reading one coming up on the train the 
other day that wasn’t bad,” remarked Hawkins with 
the ponderous air of one delivering a weighty judg- 
ment. “ Something about an American who was a 
Japanese spy.” 

“ Oh, I know the one you mean — where the 
Russian countess, or whatever she was, turns out to 
be the fellow’s mother? I read that. Say, do 
you honestly think that was any good? Why, I 
knew how it was coming out almost from the be- 
ginning ” 

“Go on — you didn’t!” Hawkins was helpless 
as an infant in the face of anything approaching a 
mystery, and his tone was utterly incredulous. 

“ Sure. The whole thing was plain as day after 
the third chapter. Of course there was a lot of 
stuff thrown in to fill up, but the thing came out 
just as I thought it would.’’ 

“ Can you really work out things like that? ” 
asked Chanler, who had taken up the red-covered 
book and was skimming through the first chapter. 

“ Not anything very elaborate, but I like to try 
it. Old Dupin, you know, in those stories of Poe’s, 
was about as keen as any of ’em, and Pm all the 
time trying to observe things and build up theories 
about them the way he did.” 

22 


SIZING UP 


“Can you detect anything about me?” Dur- 
ham had stretched himself out on the couch and he 
put the question with the smile that was continually 
hovering over his broad face. 

Bill looked at him a moment. 

“ I should say you barely made chapel this morn- 
ing,” he said. 

“You saw him come in!” broke in Hawkins. 
“ Besides, that’s a safe bet any morning if you know 
Bull — he’s always trailing in just after the last 
gun’s fired.” 

“ Shut up, Husky! let him build up his theory! ” 

‘ I should say further that you did not have 
time to eat all your breakfast — also that you have 
not finished unpacking your things yet, and that 
you have started the year with some good reso- 
lutions.” 

Durham looked around at the others with a 
perplexed grin. 

“ Do any of you see crazy things like that stick- 
ing out on me anywhere? ” he asked. 

“ But aren’t they so? ” Bill persisted. 

“ Why, yes — some of them — but how did you 
know? ” 

“ Wait a minute,” interrupted Gray, “ let’s see 
if he can do the trick twice before he tells how he 
does it. Just cast your eagle eye on me and see 
what it sees.” 


23 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Bill looked Gray over with a quick, half humor- 
ous glance. 

“ There’s isn’t so much — at least, not the same 
kind of things. I guess you had to hurry some this 
morning, too. I should say you are generally pretty 
regular in your habits — rather particular, in fact.” 

“ Right, Sherlock! He’s a regular old woman,” 
laughed Chanler. “ You seem to be pretty keen on 
telling what^time people got up — how about me? ” 

“ Can’t tell. There isn’t anything about you 
to tell by.” 

“ But how did you know those other things — 
the things about me? ” asked Durham. “ Of course 
there’s some way that’s perfectly silly, it’s so sim- 
ple — the fellow that the story-book detective explains 
things to always seems like a blooming idiot; but 
I give it up — what’s the answer? ” 

Bill laughed. “ It was mostly guesswork, with 
what I already knew about you to help me out and 
two or three little somethings to start with. Did I 
really hit on anything? ” 

“You hit on everything, except that about good 
resolutions. I don’t know just what you meant by 
that.” 

“ Well, there’s mud on your shoes ” 

“ Oh, Lord! and I’ve wiped ’em all over your 
couch ! ” 

“ It won’t hurt anything — I thought you prob- 
24 


SIZING UP 


ably got it there by going through some wet grass 
before crossing the road — it isn’t muddy to-day. 
From that I inferred that you probably didn’t have 
much time to get to chapel in, so you took a short 
cut. You were running, because your shoes sank 
into the dirt deeper than they would if you’d just 
been walking, and as your shoes were wet, the dirt 
stuck. If you’d had plenty of time you’d, have stayed 
on the sidewalk, where there’s no wet grass and 
no dirt to speak of.” 

“ That’s just imagination,” grunted Hawkins. 

“ That’s all detective theories ever are — imagi- 
nation and logic and plenty of common sense.” 

“ But how about the rest of it — the breakfast 
and the unpacking?” Durham questioned. 

“ You’ve got an orange or a good-sized apple 
in your coat pocket that I suppose you didn’t have 
time to eat at the table. You are wearing a jersey 
that’s a lot too small for you and probably belongs 
to some one else, which I don’t imagine you’d be 
doing if you’d unpacked your own, because it looks 
like a pretty tight fit. And the good resolution part 
was just a guess, to impress you with. I thought 
probably you’d resolved not to begin cutting chapel 
so early in the year, or you’d have stayed and eaten 
your whole breakfast in comfort instead of racing 
off ’cross lots to make it in time.” 

“Good! I did have some such idea as that.” 
25 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Durham lay back and chuckled. “ Only I’ve made 
that same old resolution so often that I don’t even re- 
member when I do it now. But how about Gray — 
he hasn’t any mud on his shoes.” 

“ No, but he cut himself shaving this morning, 
so I thought he might have been in a hurry.” 

“ That was Butt’s old razor — it’s as dull as a 
hoe.” 

“ Use somebody else’s then,” replied Butt se- 
renely. “ That’s one thing you’re not fussy about, 
anyway. How did you hit on the fussy habits, Bill? ” 

“ Well, if he weren’t rather fussy, he’d have 
waited till later when he had more time — it’s a fussy 
man that’ll shave himself just to go to chapel, you 
know.” 

“ Well, I still think it’s nothing but imagination,” 
persisted Hawkins. “ Those signs you went by 
might as well have meant something else as the 
things they did.” 

“ Don’t mind him. Bill,” Chanler remarked. 
‘‘ Husky tries to act like a chronic knocker, but he 
isn’t really. There’s a Christian motive behind it 
all — he does it for the good of our souls, and if he 
seems to be hitting at you it only means that he’s 
taking a kindly interest in your welfare.” 

“ That’ll be about all from you, little one,” and 
Hawkins proceeded to squelch his small classmate by 
burying him among the cushions on the couch. “ We 
26 


SIZING UP 


really came down here on business this morning,” 
he went on when the tussle had subsided. “ Why 
don’t you come down to the house to live, Bill? We 
can make room for you, if you don’t mind going in 
with Tommy Gray and me.” 

“ Sure ! It’s all nonsense, your cooping yourself 
up all alone ’way over here,” said Durham, sitting 
up and speaking very earnestly. 

“ We’d like to have you down at the house 
a lot,” added Gray. 

Bill looked at them in silence a moment — a 
half smile on his lips. It was good to be taken this 
way by these fellows. 

‘‘ It’s mighty kind of you ” he began. 

“ Shucks! We want you,” broke in Hawkins. 

‘‘ That’s how you’re kind, and it means a lot to 
me. But I can’t do it. I made up my mind when 
I came here I’d live by myself this year, and 
I think I’d better stick to it. I’ve got to, in 
fact.” 

“Why?” 

“ Well, I put in a pretty shiftless year last year. 
I did about everything I could do except work, and 
the result was I just squeezed through by the skin 
of my teeth. The old man was pretty sore about 
it and wouldn’t let me go back where the old crowd 
was. He wasn’t going to let me go back to college 
at all, but I finally got him to let me try it here for 
27 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


a year. Now it’s up to me to make good. If I 
don’t it’s hard work in an office for little William.” 

“ Now look here, Bill ! ” Chanler extricated 
himself from the heap of pillows and got to his feet, 
assuming what Durham called his “ presidential at- 
titude,” as he always did when he had an argument 
to drive home. “ We manage to have about as 
good a time as any fellows in college, but you mustn’t 
get the idea we’re a gang of loafers. Gray there is 
a regular shark — he’s got his Phi Beta Kappa key 
cinched already — and there isn’t one of us that has 
a condition. Bull and Husky couldn’t have last year 
and play football, and I couldn’t without being a 
bad example, and the habit stuck. We don’t kill our- 
selves, but we manage not to get behind, and we pull 
pretty respectable marks. We worked out a system 
last year for mutual benefit and protection, and Bull 
can tell you what happened when he got on the 
ragged edge in Math.” 

“ It was something awful I ” supplemented Dur-- 
ham. “ I never put in such a time in my life. They 
just hounded me till there wasn’t any more danger 
of my flunking. I tell you, no one can travel with 
Butt and Husky and not keep up in his work.” 

“ I wasn’t afraid you fellows would lead me 
astray — please don’t think that,” Bill protested. “ It 
may turn out that I’ll need some loving hand to guide 
me and keep me in shape, but I want to give myself 
28 


SIZING UP 


a chance at it alone first. If I haven’t it in me to 
stick to a thing and see it through by myself I 
want to find it out.” 

Chanler made no further plea. He was not bad 
at reading people, and he saw not only that Bill’s 
mind was made up, but that being made up it was 
not likely to change. Hawkins, however, still con- 
tinued the assault. 

“ I think you’re making a mountain out of some- 
thing that isn’t even a respectable sized molehill,” 
he pursued stubbornly. “ You can study at the 
house if you want to, and you’ll be with the fel- 
lows there. You’re a new man here, and I should 
think that would be something : it would make 
it lots quicker and easier for you to get ac- 
quainted.” 

“ Please, I know every single thing I’m missing 
by staying here, but I’ve got to stay. For another 
thing, I had the hardest job I ever tackled getting 
Mrs. Sleeper to give me a room, and I can’t go back 
on her now. Besides, I rather want to prove to 
her that college students are really human beings: 
she thinks they’re some sort of a dangerous wild 
animal.” 

“ It isn’t such a terribly serious matter after all,” 
remarked Gray. “ It’s only a few minutes’ walk 
down to the house anyway, and we’ll see a lot of 
one another.” 


29 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Right you are, Tommy ” 

Mr. Bill! Mrs. Sleeper’s voice came up to 
them in a shrill call from below. Another visitor 
proved to be the cause of it — McCarthy, the sopho- 
more who had been about to take Bill in hand the 
night before when it was discovered that he had 
disappeared. He came bounding up the stairs and 
into the room, with his lean, freckled face twisted 
into as merry a grin as ever sat upon a homely 
countenance. 

“ I’ve been hunting all over thunder for Butt 
Chanler,” he announced, “ and somebody said he 
left chapel with you. Anything private going on? ” 

“ Not a bit. Come on in and sit down — unless 
you want to see Chanler alone,” was Bill’s greeting. 

“ Bill’s been having a little reception, and in- 
cidentally telling us things about ourselves. What 
do you see about Mac, Bill? Anything you aren’t 
ashamed to tell? ” asked Durham with a laugh. 

“What’s the game?” asked McCarthy, empty- 
ing some tobacco into a cigarette paper. “ Fortune- 
telling? Nothing doing with me. I haven’t got one. 
My face is my fortune, and you see what that’s good 
for.” 

“ Oh, he doesn’t do that sort of thing. He 
gives you a careless glance and then tells you what 
time you got up and whether you had to hurry to 
get to chapel and a few little things- like that.” 

30 


SIZING UP 

/ 

McCarthy’s eyes twinkled as he lighted his 
cigarette. 

“ Go as far as you like. Do you think you can 
tell from just a careless glance what time I got to 
chapel? ” 

‘‘ You didn’t get to chapel this morning,” an- 
swered Bill quietly. 

What f ” 

‘‘ Did you?” 

‘‘No. But ” 

“Didn’t I ♦•ell you he could tell you things?” 
asked Durham triumphantly. “ Go on, Bill, you’re 
doing fine.” 

Bill looked at McCarthy questioningly. 

“ Sure — go as far as you like,” McCarthy re- 
peated, and the twinkle crept back into his eyes. 
“ What time did I get up? ” 

“ You didn’t go to bed,” said Bill slowly. “ You 
only took a nap with your clothes on, and when you 
woke up you rushed right out to find Chanler. You 
were out pretty late, and you had a pretty rough 
night of it. It was wet as well as rough, and you 
did a good deal of beating around through woods 
and fields.” 

McCarthy’s jaw dropped, and the others stared 
at Bill as if he had been seized with a fit of 
lunacy. 

“Well!” ejaculated Hawkins. “That’s going 

31 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


some ! How did you hit on that particular kind of 
a pipe dream? ” 

“ Isn’t it true? ” asked Bill. 

McCarthy nodded his head in bewilderment. 

“ Yes, but — you didn’t dope that all out yourself, 
did you? ” 

The others turned their stares from Bill to Mc- 
Carthy. 

“ Oh, Bill’s a regular Sherlock Holmes,” said 
Chanler at length. “ He doped it out himself all 
right, unless it’s a put-up job between you.” 

“ It isn’t,” protested McCarthy. “ But it beats 
me. Who told you?” 

“ Nobody.” 

“ How did you know it, then? ” asked Chanler. 

“ Well, he practically said himself that he wasn’t 
at chapel — he wanted to see you, and he’d have seen 
you if he’d been there. Then his clothes look — er — 
sort of slept in, and there’s a feather sticking on the 
back of his coat. Didn’t you go to sleep on some 
pillows with your coat on?” he asked, turning to 
McCarthy. 

“ Yes — on the couch. I didn’t go to bed.” 

“ Well, you’d have got undressed and gone to 
bed if it hadn’t been pretty well along toward morn- 
ing, and you were anxious not to oversleep. Your 
shoes and clothes have had mud on them, and one 
of your legs has been in water up to the knee. 

32 


SIZING UP 


There’s a piece of a burr sticking to the right leg of 
your trousers and another one higher up, and there’s a 
twig caught in the side of your coat. You evidently 
didn’t stop to brush up before you started out this 
morning — so you must have been in a hurry.” 

McCarthy was examining his clothes with rather 
a shamefaced expression. 

“ I do look pretty seedy. Got a brush broom 
around anywhere ? Say, I’ll take off my hat to you. 
Bill,” he exclaimed, as he vigorously attacked his 
coat with the clothes brush. “ If you can tell me 
what I was doing out last night, you’re the only and 
original Hawkshaw, King of Detectives.” 

Bill puckered up his forehead and then smiled. 

“It must have been something to do with the 
class because you wanted to see Chanler. I guess 
you must have been doing some hazing — that was 
the only class business going on last night.” 

McCarthy threw the brush into a corner. 

“ He’s hit it,” he said, turning to Butt. 

“ What do you mean? ” 

“ I tried some hazing on my own account after 
you fellows had gone, and I came pretty near making 
a mess out of it. I didn’t get in till almost five 
o’clock this morning.” 

“What!” 

“ You oughtn’t to have done that, Mac,” said 
Butt. “ We agreed to cut it out at ten o’clock.” 

33 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ I know that — but you listen a minute.” 

“ But you might get into all sorts of trouble,” 
protested Butt. He was evidently getting more and 
more disturbed the more he thought about it. “ Five 
o’clock in the morning! Why it’s criminal to keep 
a freshman out all night like that! If the faculty 
get hold of it they’ll make a terrible fuss about it, 
and nobody’ll blame them.” 

“Won’t you wait and hear about it?” cried 
McCarthy impatiently. “ I’ve thought of all that, 
but I don’t care if they do find it out. I’d do the 
same thing over again — and I’m not through with 
it yet.” 

“Now, Mac, you’re going to be reasonable! ” 
said Butt. “ You’re not going to do anything fool- 
ish. I should think you’d done enough of that 
already.” 

“ Let him tell his story,” interrupted Hawkins. 

But McCarthy was ruffled and needed some 
smoothing down before he was willing to go on with 
his tale. 

“ Yx)u’d have done something yourself,” he said 
finally. “ After you fellows had left the Dorms, I 
thought I’d go home myself and go to bed. I wasn’t 
looking for trouble — if anyone ever tells you that 
hazing isn’t hard work, you can tell him he’s a liar. 
He doesn’t know what he’s talking about. I’d had 
enough of it at ten o’clock.” 

34 


SIZING UP 


“ Why didn’t you go home then? ” 

“ I tell you I was going to. But I wanted a 
match, and I stopped to get one from one of the 
freshmen. I was just going to open the door of his 
room when I heard a great racket inside, and of 
course I stopped to listen. They were laughing a 
lot as if something pretty funny was going on. It 
didn’t take long to find out what it was. Some fresh- 
man was telling them how he’d dodged the sopho- 
mores, and how many times they’d come pretty near 
catching him, and how clever he was, and kept fool- 
ing them, and stayed hiding till they’d all gone.” 

“ That’s rot,” interrupted Chanler. “ We didn’t 
know about any freshman hiding at all — except Bill.” 

“ Of course it was — nobody had hunted for him 
at all ; they didn’t know there was any such person. 
But he was hiding all right, or some of us would 
have come across him. But anyway he made a great 
yarn about it, and he was a great hero — those fresh- 
men thought it was the best joke they’d ever heard. 
As soon as I saw what was going on I walked in on 
’em. They shut up like clams, and that freshman 
just sat there and looked foolish.” 

“Who was he?” 

“ Nichols, or Nicholson, or something like that 
— nobody I’d ever heard of before. He couldn’t 
have been here during rushing or I’d have seen him. 
He had ‘ quitter ’ written all over him — eyes that 
35 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


sort of shifted and never looked square at you. I 
sized him up right away, and asked him what the 
funny story was I’d butted in on. I guess he decided 
I looked easy. Anyway, he began to swell out his 
chest and spout about how he wasn’t going to be 
ordered around by any sophomore, and a lot of big 
talk like that. It would have made you sore if you’d 
been there — it couldn’t have helped it.” 

“ What did you do about it? ” 

“Well, I wasn’t sore at first: it struck me sort 
of funny. But he got so fresh after a while that it 
was sickening. I put on my scowl and says : ‘ Look 
here, Mr. Freshman, are you trying to be funny, or do 
you mean all this stuff you’re talking? ’ He swelled 
up some more and said he meant it all right. ‘ All 
right,’ says I, ‘ I think you and me’ll go for a little 
stroll together.’ I guess the rest of ’em were looking 
for a fight then, but there wasn’t any. He went 
along out with me without making any fuss at all. 
Well, the stroll we took was quite some stroll, let 
me inform you. He didn’t have the nerve to scrap 
or I’d have licked him. I was just mad enough to 
wish he would. He did everything I told him to, 
but he did it in the nastiest way he could think of, 
and sassed me till it was all I could do to keep from 
punching his head.” 

“ That’s what I’d have done,” interposed Haw- 
kins gruffly. 


36 


SIZING UP 


“ Well, I knew that was against the principles of 
Mr. Chanler, here, and besides I was afraid that 
was just what he was looking for — he seemed just 
like the sort of a mutt that would get a man to hit 
him and then run and tattle about It to the faculty. 
So I just kept him on the jump till I was pretty 
near dead myself. It got to be twelve o’clock. I’d 
been making him climb telegraph poles, and bark 
at the moon, and sing, and jump ditches, and he did 
every blooming thing, but he stayed just as fresh as 
ever. Finally I decided to take him down to the 
river. I was rippin’ mad clear through, and I 
thought he’d show fight at that. I knew If he’d 
fight I could take It out of him all right. I told 
him I was going to duck him, and I think I could 
have done It at that — he’s as big as I am, but he 
hasn’t any more backbone than a caterpillar. He 
went along without kicking a bit. I kept remarking 
how nice and cool the water would be and how nice 
and far from home we were, and he just grinned a 
sickly grin and tried to be sarcastic. He wasn’t very 
strong for my little scheme, but he couldn’t get up 
his nerve to call a halt, so we kept on.” 

“ You’re a persevering customer,” said Hawkins 
as McCarthy got up to toss the butt of his cigarette 
out the window. “ I can’t see myself prowling 
arouncj the country In the dark for any freshman 
living.” 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

“ The moon came up about half past eleven 
and we could see well enough. Finally we got 
across the fields and down to the river — that wide, 
shallow part just before you come to the pool 
where we tried to go swimming last spring. He 
stopped on the bank and looked at me with that 
sickly grin, and says, ‘ Well, go ahead and duck 
me.* That was calling my bluff pretty strong, and 
I grabbed hold of his arm, when he gave a quick 
sort of a twist and landed me with one foot in the 
water.’* 

“ Thus wetting one leg up to the knee, as Billiam 
has observed,” interpolated Chanler. 

“ While I was getting out he beat it, and I was 
fool enough to chase him. And I didn’t get him.” 
McCarthy looked around the company with a rueful 
twist on his freckled face. 

“ Rather fresh, wasn’t he? ” remarked Durham 
gravely. 

‘‘ He certainly gave me a run before he finally 
dodged me. I don’t know how many miles away 
it landed me, but it was quarter to five when I 
got back to the house. I was so dead to the world 
I just passed away on the couch without taking my 
clothes off.” 

“ Bill gave the outline of those doings pretty 
well, I should say,” said Durham. “ You can’t call 
that nothing but imagination, Husky.” 

38 


SIZING UP 


“ What made you rush out in such a hurry this 
morning? ” asked Bill. 

“ I began to think of that poor fool wandering 
around in the woods.” 

“ Oh, he’ll find his way back all right. You can’t 
get lost very permanently anywhere around Tresh- 
am,” said Gray. 

“What are you going to do about it? Send 
out a search party? ” questioned Durham. 

“ He’s back already. That’s what I got up so 
blamed early to find out. I didn’t oversleep, Bill. 
You struck it wrong there. I was up before any of 
you were, I bet, and it wasn’t Butt I was looking 
for. It was that fellow Nichols, and I found him 
all right ! ” 

“ Where was he? ” 

“ Up in his room. He’d routed out a lot of 
freshmen, and there he was, holding forth on how 
he’d fooled the sophomores, just like last night. The 
reason I wasn’t at chapel was because I stopped to 
have a little talk with him.” 

“ I don’t see where your night’s work did very 
much good,” said Hawkins. “ Hadn’t he calmed 
down at all? ” 

“ Not a bit. I tried to reason with him, a la 
Butt, and he just sat there and grinned. Finally 
he did get ugly, and began to make threats.” 

“ Is he going to tell? ” demanded Butt. 

39 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ No, they weren’t those kind of threats. He 
just told me I’d gone too far and I’d be sorry. He 
said he wasn’t going to make any trouble with the 
faculty or anything like that. He was going to 
follow my own methods, and I needn’t think I could 
skin out of it, because I couldn’t.” 

“What did he mean?” 

“ You’ve got me. I don’t know. That’s what 
I wanted to see you about.” 

“ Oh, he was just hot-airing! ” exclaimed Haw- 
kins. “ I should think you’d heard enough of his 
talk to know that.” 

“ That’s what I thought, but this was different. 
He didn’t blow so hard about it, for one thing. He 
got real quiet and serious, and mad, the way he 
didn’t get all last night, and said that no sophomore 
would ever try that kind of hazing again. He said 
it was hard luck that I should be the victim, but I’d 
brought it on myself, and there wasn’t any use 
trying to dodge it, for I couldn’t. The whole sopho- 
more class can’t save me, he says.” 

“ Nonsense I ” exclaimed Butt. “ He was string- 
ing you.” 

“ Maybe he was, but it’s a different kind of 
stringing than I ever ran up against before.” 

“ He’s got you scared I ” 

Strangely enough, McCarthy did not go up in the 
air at this accusation. 


40 


SIZING UP 


‘‘ No, he hasn’t,” he answered seriously. “ But 
he’s got me guessing. He was so quiet and cock- 
sure about it. I want to know what’s up I ” 

“ Maybe he’s going to throw a bomb at you,” 
suggested Durham. 

“ No; but he’s really got some kind of a game 
on. After I’d left his room I hung around and 
watched. He went out and waited outside the chapel 
till the fellows came out, and then he nabbed a 
couple of them and they went off whispering. When 
they saw me following, they broke up — and then 
I came down here.” 

“ They can’t do anything to you,” said Butt. 

** Of course they can’t. I’m not worrying about 
that. But I don’t like to be puzzled so I ” Mc- 
Carthy scowled at the floor, deep in thought. 

Suddenly his face lighted. 

“I know I Bill!” 

“ What about me? ” asked Bill. 

“ You can find out,” cried McCarthy. 

Bill laughed. 

“ That’s in a different line,” he said. “ I’m no 
good at finding out that sort of thing.” 

“ But listen I The fellows here don’t know you 
yet — the freshmen especially. You can pass your- 
self off as a freshman and get in with ’em, and 
find out the whole business.” 

Bill laughed again. 


41 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ I don’t think that would work,” he said. 

“ Of course it would I You fooled us last night. 
Why can’t you do the same with a lot of freshmen? ” 
You could, Bill,” put in Hawkins. “ Why don’t 
you? ” 

“ I think you’re making a lot of fuss over 
nothing at all,” protested Butt. “ What’s the use 
of dragging Bill into it?” 

“ Now don’t you go to butting in ! I know there 
is something! Won’t you do it, Bill — at least, try 
it?” 

‘‘ I don’t mind trying it, but don’t blame me if 
you’re blown up or something like that before I find 
out.” 

McCarthy grinned. 

“ I’ll risk it. You know. Bill, I think you’re 
pretty good, and I wouldn’t say that unless I rneant 
it.” 

“Doesn’t that mean the end of the hour?” 
asked Bill suddenly, listening to the sound of a bell 
ringing. “By golly! I’ll miss my first recitation if 
I don’t look out. I’ll see you fellows later — stay 
here if you want to, but I’ve got to run.” 

He was out of the room and down the stairs 
before the bell stopped ringing, and when the rest 
of them had reached the sidewalk, he was already 
breasting the top of the campus hill. 


CHAPTER III 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 

B ill was to meet Chanler after lunch at the 
Glee Club trials, which were to be held in the 
small chapel early in the afternoon, and there 
report what he had learned about the Nichols con- 
spiracy. Durham had stolen a covert glance at Butt 
and Hawkins had openly stared when Bill announced 
that he was going out for the Glee Club, though 
they made no comment. When he had left them, 
however, Hawkins said that he felt it would be 
nothing less than kindness to tell him gently but 
firmly that any attempt to do anything with such a 
voice as his was a sheer waste of time. Butt merely 
smiled. He was inclined to think that Bill could look 
out for himself, and he had his own worries when 
it came to trials. Butt had not gone in for musical 
glory the year before, but this year he was trying 
for both the Glee and Mandolin Clubs, hoping that 
his being able to double up and save them an extra 
man might make up for the fact that he wasn’t very 
much of a singer and only a fair mandolin player. 
43 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


They both showed up for the trials early. There 
were fifteen or twenty men, mostly freshmen, already 
waiting, and an upperclassman was playing rag-time 
on the rattly old piano, while a sober-faced senior 
danced a double-shuffle by himself in the corner. 

Bill was standing by the window when Butt came 
up to him. 

“ We’d better not be seen talking together,” Bill 
said, lowering his voice. “ I can’t keep up this fresh- 
man pose very long anyway, and some one would be 
sure to wonder if they saw me talking to you. They 
all know you, you know.” 

‘‘ All right — I’ll manage to see you somehow 
before we get through,” and Butt strolled over to the 
piano. 

Presently Tod Smith, the leader of the club, 
arrived in company with a Kappa Chi senior whom 
Bill had already met at the house — a big, rosy-faced 
blond, who had signed himself ‘‘ F. E. Colchester ” 
when he first came to college and then immediately 
changed it to “ Franklin Eugene ” because they be- 
gan at once to call him “ Effie.” But the nickname 
had stuck, in spite of his six feet and two hundred 
and odd pounds and the deep voice that made him 
a tower of strength on the second bass part of the 
Glee Club. 

“Hello, Bill! Going to join the songbirds?” 
he stopped to question as he passed. “ What part? ” 
44 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


“Tenor, I guess. Any chance?’’ 

“ Every chance, if you’re first tenor. The part’s 
pretty weak.” 

The leader rapped sharply on the piano rack to 
call attention. 

“ You’ll draw lots for trials,” he announced, 
taking a handful of paper slips from his pocket, 
“ and then wait outside. Please be right ready 
when your turn comes: we want to run ’em off as 
fast as we can.” 

There was a scramble for the numbered paper 
slips and then a general exodus into the hall outside. 
Bill had drawn Number 3, so he waited by the door. 
Butt stopped at his side for an instant as he passed, 
holding up his slip so that the number “ 15 ” showed, 
and then went on into the big chapel, with a meaning 
glance over his shoulder as the door closed behind 
him. 

“Have you ever tried for the club before?” 
politely asked a freshman behind Bill, combining in 
his question a natural opening to conversation and 
a feeler as to what class Bill belonged to. 

“ No: this is my first year here.” 

The freshman’s face lighted with fellow feeling. 
“ Say,” and his tone was decidedly less formal, 
“what do they do at these trials anyway? I sup- 
pose it’s foolish, but I’ve got sort of an attack of 
stage-fright.” 


45 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


The question was partially answered from the 
room where the first trial had just begun : a nervous 
and shaky voice was mounting uncertainly up the 
scale, to break dismally on a high note. 

“ I guess he has stage-fright, too,” Bill replied. 
“ I suppose they make allowances for that, but really 
there isn’t much to be scared of. They just want 
you to show whether you can sing or not. If you 
can you’re what they’re looking for, and you’re all 
right.” 

The freshman looked dubious. 

“ I’m afraid I’m not much of a singer when it 
comes to scales and fancy business. They made 
short work of him,” he added, as the door opened 
and the first victim came out, a sheepish g.rin on 
his face. 

The second man was not long in following, and 
it came Bill’s turn. Colchester sat at the piano as 
he entered, with Tod Smith standing close by, tak- 
ing notes. 

“ What part? ” Smith asked shortly. 

“ Tenor.” 

Smith turned his back and walked over to the 
other side of the room, apparently leaving all fur- 
ther proceedings to Colchester, who began striking 
a few mechanical chords on the piano. 

“ Try singing up the scale,” he said, fixing his 
eyes in a far-away look on the ceiling. 

46 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


Though his voice was light, Bill really could 
sing. As he went confidently up the scale Colches- 
ter’s gaze left the ceiling and rested on the singer. 
He went up and up, and Tod Smith came hurrying, 
back from across the room. 

“Whoever told you he couldn’t sing, Effie?” 
he demanded. “ What was that top note he struck? ” 

“ B. Can you go higher? ” Colchester asked, 
still looking at Bill. 

“Sometimes; but I’m usually afraid of busting 
something.” 

“ Well, B’s high enough for all practical pur- 
poses,” Tod Smith remarked, jotting down some- 
thing in his notes. “ Can you read music? ” 

“ After a fashion.” 

“ Ever sing much? ” 

“ I sang on our Glee Club for a while last 
year.” 

“ Say, Bill, are you a joker? ” put in Colchester 
slowly. 

“Why, no, I don’t think so. Why?” Bill 
looked puzzled at the sudden turn the questioning 
had taken. 

“ You’ve been stringing young Hawkins good 
and proper, anyway. Hawkins came tumbling into 
my room this morning to get me to try you out 
privately — he has a kind heart, you know, and he 
wanted to spare you the shame of a public down- 
47 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


fall, and that sort of thing. He said you couldn’t 
sing any more than Bull Durham can, and that’s 
putting it about as strong as possible.” 

“ And Effie was just begging me to let you 
down gently when you came in,” added Smith. 

Bill threw back his head and laughed. 

“ I don’t blame Hawkins much, but I thought he 
knew. They took me for a freshman last night and 
tried hazing me a while, and Hawkins told me to 
sing. You know they’d rather have a freshman 
sing rottenly than any other way — it’s funnier. So 
I tried to please them.” 

“ Well, you tell Hawkins you’ve been given a 
second trial : that ought to set him wondering some,” 
said Smith. “ You’ll get an announcement about 
when the second trials come off. Will you ask the 
next man to come in? ” 

Colchester gave Bill a discreet wink as he turned 
toward the door. 

The freshman who had been feeling symptoms 
of stage-fright was now fast in the clutches of it, and 
apparently readier to run away than to obey Smith’s 
summons. 

“ Nothing to be afraid of,” Bill assured him. 
“ Holler right out at ’em.” 

The freshman gave a final screw to his courage 
and bolted through the door, while Bill strolled non- 
chalantly into the big chapel. As the door closed 
48 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


behind him Butt’s head bobbed up from behind one 
of the front seats. 

“ Better duck down out of sight: some one may 
look in,” he cautioned. ‘‘ How’d you come out? ” 

“ They’re going to give me a second trial,” an- 
swered Bill, curling himself up on the seat beside 
him. 

“ Good work! I had a hunch that wasn’t a real 
specimen of your singing you were giving us last 
night. But say. Bill, how about it — this racket of 
Mac’s, I mean? I’ve been thinking about it while 
I’ve been waiting here, and I’ve pretty near made up 
my mind it’s all nonsense. This conspiracy business 
and meeting in secret and everything seems to me 
like a lot of foolishness. What did you find out this 
morning? ” 

“ I didn’t find out anything really. I butted 
gently into a bunch of three fellows this man Nichols 
was talking with, and sort of made myself at home 
with them. I made them think I was a freshman 
all right, but they didn’t say anything that was worth 
listening to. I got friendly enough so they would 
have talked right out, I think, but we were out- 
doors, and that may have made a difference. If 
there’s really anything up they naturally wouldn’t 
have talked about it there anyway.” 

“ Couldn’t you stick with them till they got 
somewhere where they could talk? ” 

49 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“I tried to; the whole bunch went into the 
Dorms, and I trotted along with them. They stuck 
<:ogether and made for one of the rooms on the 
third floor and I thought from that that perhaps 
they really had something to talk over. But we 
ran into Freshman Burnet in the hall, and I ducked. 
He’d probably have remembered that automobik 
party I had up in his room last night, and there 
wasn’t any use trying to pass as a classmate with 
him.” 

Butt smiled. 

“No: I should^ay not. Bunny Burnet comes 
from the same town I do and I know him pretty 
well. He’s a rather wise youth in his way.” 

“ Well, I didn’t take any chances, so I don’t 
know any more than I did before I started 
out.” 

“ I imagine you know about all there is to know 
at that. Mac has a habit of going up in the air once 
in a while, and you get him started and he’ll think 
up more crazy things in five minutes than you and 
I could in a week. Let’s tell him the whole thing’s 
rubbish! ” 

“ Let’s wait till to-night. I want to tackle that 
man Nichols again. I haven’t had a fair shot at 
him yet. Perhaps I can really settle things this after- 
noon if that wise freshman of yours doesn’t come 
along and scare me off.” 


50 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 

Butt still thought it was all rubbish, but he as- 
sented. 

“ All right, if you want to, but I think it’s a 
waste of time. Perhaps I can get hold of Bunny 
Burnet and keep him occupied for a while.” 

“ I wish you would. When I’m sleuthing, I 
want to sleuth without any interruptions. When 
do you think you can get the coast clear? ” 

“ I don’t know. I’ll see how many men there 
are ahead of me now. I may have time to hunt him 
up before my turn comes. But I don’t want to miss 
warbling for Tod Smith: it may be the last chance 
I’ll ever have.” 

“ They won’t get to you for half an hour yet. 
They spend at least five minutes with each man 
and they didn’t start till after half past one : 
you’re Number 15, and that makes it twenty min- 
utes of three before they’ll get to you, at the 
earliest.” 

“Great head you’ve got for mathematics. Bill! 
Let’s beat it then. I’ll go first and you can stroll 
along afterwards. Do you suppose we’re fooling 
anybody by all these precautions?” Butt stood up 
and shook himself. 

Bill laughed as he got to his feet. 

“ Probably not, but probably nobody’s paying 
any attention to us. But what’s the harm? ” 

“ Well, you keep watch, and if all goes well, 

51 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


you’ll see Freshman Burnet led forth very shortly,” 
and Butt hurried out. 

The flock of would-be songsters had thinned 
perceptibly when Bill at length ventured into the hall. 
The upperclassmen among them had gone outdoors 
to wait, where they had captured a freshman who 
had been carelessly straying about the campus, and 
compelled him to do stunts for their amusement. Bill 
saw what was going on and went out by a side door. 
He did not care about playing the part of a first-year 
man to the extent of offering himself as another 
victim. He kept carefully out of sight, and finally 
took up his station in the lower hall of South College, 
where Burnet roomed. He had been there only a 
few minutes when Butt came down the stairs. 

“ I guess you’ll find the coast clear now,” he 
said. “ Bunny’s got a recitation this hour. The 
hour’s nearly up, but if I see him I’ll steer him 
away.” 

“ Thanks.” Bill mounted the stairs and sought 
the room where Nichols and his crowd had gone in 
the morning. He was just about to enter when the 
door opened and McCarthy came out. McCarthy 
stopped abruptly, drawing the door to behind him. 

“Did you find out anything?” he whispered, 
taking Bill by the arm and leading him down the hall. 

“ No : I’m just hitting the warpath again. Is 
your man in there? ” 


52 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


“ No, there’s no one there but a freshman 
named Robertson, but he’s one of the gang. I’ve 
just been in giving him a little fatherly advice.” 

“ Then perhaps I’d better drop in and offer him 
a little brotherly sympathy. It ought to go pretty 
well after your paternal business.” 

“ Sure, go ahead. And nose around. Bill ! 
There’s something up. I know it, and you can find 
out what it is if anyone can.” 

“ Oh, I’ll nose around, but really, Mac, don’t 
you think there’s a chance you’ve struck a wrong 
hunch? ” 

“Wrong hunch I No, sir! Not this time I Why, 
I tell you ” 

“ We’d better not be talking about it here : some 
of the conspirators might come along, and you may 
be right anyway. Only it doesn’t look like freshmen 
to lay plots for getting even with sophomores : they 
wouldn’t know what to do even if they thought of 
it. Besides, if they know anything at all, they must 
know they’re sure to get the worst of it.” 

“ That may all be, but you take it from me, that 
fellow Nichols has something up his sleeve.” 

“ All right. I’ll try to find out what it is. What’s 
this fellow’s name in here — Robertson? ” 

“ Yes. And you’ll find him good and sore unless 
he’s got over it.” 

“ I’ll comfort him, then. So long.” 

53 


5 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Robertson was good and sore, for a fact. Bill 
found him red and sulky, and ready to pour forth 
his grievances Into the first willing ear. Bill gave 
him the cue at once. 

“ Hello, Bob,” he said genially, trusting his 
friendly tone to make amends If he struck the wrong 
nickname. “ Been having a visitor? Wasn’t that 
a sophomore I just met In the hall? ” 

Sophomore ? ” Robertson’s tone spoke wrath. 
“ That was the fellow that took Nichols out last 
night.” 

“ Oh ! ” Bill’s exclamation was full of sympa- 
thetic Interest and the desire to hear more. 

“ I suppose it’s up to a freshman to stand a 
reasonable amount of hazing and get what fun 
he can^^ut of it. But there’s a limit, and that 
man McCarthy has just about reached it with 
me.” 

“ Was that McCarthy who was just in here? ” 
Bill saw that Robertson was too wrought up to be 
hospitable, so he helped himself to a chair. 

“ Yes; he was here for ten minutes, jawing me 
about how fresh Nichols is and how I’d better not 
travel around with him too much if I don’t want to 
queer myself. I knew Nichols had a good right to 
be sore at him, but I figured it out it was none of 
my business. But I’ve changed my mind now. It’s 
my business and every other freshman’s, and I’ll 
54 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


stick by Nick now if it gets the whole sophomore 
class down on me.” 

“We certainly ought to stick by Nick,” Bill 
murmured, feeling that he was called upon to express 
some sort of approbation. 

“We’ll do it, too! ” Robertson stood up and 
thumped the table with his fist. “ They think we 
freshmen are green and afraid, and can’t work 
together, but we’ll show ’em ! I tell you my blood’s 
up, and I’ll see this thing through if it gets the 
whole sophomore class down on me ! ” Robertson’s 
fire rather died out as he realized he was repeating 
himself. “ I’ll do it if I get expelled from college 
for it! ” he added, his voice rising as he hit upon 
the new climax. 

“ Er — you don’t think there’s any chant 3 of that, 
do you ? ” Bill asked, after the pause of appre- 
ciation that Robertson’s courageous spirit plainly 
called for. 

“ Well, no. But it’s just like McCarthy to make 
trouble. Nick says McCarthy will be so ashamed 
that he’ll take good care it never leaks out through 
him, but I’m not so sure.” 

“When do you expect it to come off?” Bill 
felt that it was time he was learning something 
definite about what “ it ” was. Evidently Mac 
wasn’t so far off in his suspicions after all. 

Robertson looked at him sharply. 

55 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Oh, Lord! ” thought Bill. “ IVe put my foot 
in it now.” 

“ Weren’t you up here this morning? ” Robert- 
son asked with a perceptible cooling in his tone. 

“ I had to leave before we’d got very far. To 
tell the truth, Bob, I don’t know much about what 
the plans are. I don’t want to be butting in, but I 
can’t help being interested. Of course, if you feel 
you can’t trust me. I’m sorry, and I suppose we’ll 
have to let it go at that.” Bill stood up, a look of 
mingled apology and regret on his face. “ I can 
honestly say, though, I don’t know enough about 
what’s doing so that you need to be afraid I can give 
anything away.” 

His tone, as much as his words, probably, had 
a reassuring effect, for Robertson thawed imme- 
diately. 

“That’s all right: I’m sorry I spoke as I did. 
But Nick picked his crowd, and he said we weren’t 
to tell anybody else a thing about it. I was under 
the impression you were here this morning. I cer- 
tainly remember your coming up the stairs with us. 
But all of a sudden I happened to think I didn’t 
know your name.” 

“ My name’s Bill.” 

“ Sure, I ought to have remembered,” but Rob- 
ertson’s tone told plainly that he didn’t remember 
even yet, though he politely pretended to. “ Well, 

56 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 

it all depends on chance a good deal. If we’re 
lucky ” 

He stopped short, for the chapel clock had begun 
to strike. 

“ Three o’clock. Nick will be up here in a few 
minutes and he’ll tell you how things are to go. He’s 
probably made some changes since this morning.” 

Bill acquiesced with outward serenity and some 
inward uneasiness. Robertson was evidently going 
to be more cautious henceforth, feeling, no doubt, 
that he had let his indignation against McCarthy 
make him too outspoken. As a matter of fact, 
Robertson felt that Bill was all right, and was 
perfectly willing to take him completely into his con- 
fidence, but Nichols had been very explicit in de- 
manding secrecy, and perhaps it was just as well to 
wait. 

Bill awaited Nichols’s coming with a good deal 
of curiosity. Even if he succeeded in learning 
nothing more, the mere certainty that something was 
really afoot was enough to keep the sophomores 
from being led into anything very dreadful. But 
Bill wanted more definite information. Whatever 
plan was being concocted was evidently to be directed 
against McCarthy, rather than against the sopho- 
more class, and that gave it a personal interest that 
made him anxious to know as much about it as he 
could. He liked McCarthy. So he sat waiting, and 
SI 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


wondered meanwhile how much more juggling with 
fact he would have to do before he was done. 

Nichols was not long in coming, and he brought 
two others with him. Bill had picked up a magazine 
that lay on Robertson’s desk and was busy looking 
at it, but he nodded to them as they came in, keeping 
his seat serenely, as though his being there was quite 
a matter of course. Without appearing to do so, 
he saw Nichols look at him sharply and then ex- 
change glances with Robertson. Robertson beck- 
oned Nichols over to the window, and Bill could 
even get the drift of what passed between them. 

“ He’s all right. His name’s Bill. I don’t know 
his last name,” he heard Robertson whisper earnest- 
ly. “ He’s as strong against McCarthy as any of us.” 

“ Does he know all about it? ” and from the 
corner of his eye Bill could see that Nichols was 
looking him over. 

“ No: he just knows there is something; that’s 
all. Let’s let him in on it I ” 

“ Oh, I suppose he’s all right. I wanted one 
more man anyway. I asked that fellow Rowson, 
upstairs, to come around — he’s pretty sore at the 
sophomores, but one extra won’t do any harm.” 

Nichols came over and leaned against the table 
beside Bill, and Bill, taking that as a prelude to 
conversation, laid down his magazine and looked up 
at him. This rebellious freshman was not especially 
58 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


prepossessing to look at, certainly. He was inclined 
to fatness, a lazy, flabby fat, and his face seemed 
to be continually perspiring. He had an unpleasant 
mouth, and his eyes certainly gave some ground for 
McCarthy’s adjective — shifty. 

“ So you want to come In on this McCarthy 
deal? ” he remarked with a rather heavy attempt at 
friendliness. 

Sure.” 

“ Why? Do you know him? ” 

“ Well, I haven’t had any trouble with McCar- 
thy myself, but I’d like to be In on this. I should 
think It would be pretty good fun.” 

“ I guess It will — but not for him,” and Nichols 
smiled widely. The fact Is, we’re just picking him 
out as an example. The whole thing’s a matter of 
principle. This hazing business Isn’t right. A little 
of It may do very well In a way, but, after all. It Isn’t 
right, and sophomores carry It too far. McCarthy’s 
a good example because he’s one of the worst ones 
at It. I say they’ll cut It out If the freshmen really 
put up an opposition. The trouble Is, freshmen have 
stood for It so long they think they’ve always got to.” 

“ So this Is going to be a sort of revolution,” 
remarked Bill thoughtfully. 

“ That’s putting It rather big, but I think It will 
open people’s eyes a little. There are only half a 
dozen of us — you make seven. We’re all here now 
59 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


but Rowson and Burnet, and they’ll be here in a 
minute or two, and then we’ll talk the whole thing 
over. I haven’t got the plans all worked out yet, 
but I have pretty nearly. We want to pull the thing 
off to-night if we can, because to-morrow night’s 
the flag rush and 1 suppose we’ll all be pretty well 
tired out after that.” 

Burnet ! That man was bobbing up everywhere. 
Bill seemed fated not to escape him. And he was 
coming in a few minutes to take part in this council 
of war! Bill was half minded to beat a retreat 
immediately, but his curiosity to know more details 
got the better of him. If Butt did his duty, it would 
be considerably more than a few minutes before 
Freshman Burnet would be free to do any plotting. 

“What’s your idea?” he asked, hoping to get 
some general scheme of things before the real coun- 
cil began. Then if it were necessary he could flee 
before Burnet had a chance to spot him. 

“ We’re going to give McCarthy some of his 
own medicine — haze him good and proper, until he 
squeals for help. When we get through with him 
I rather imagine he’ll let freshmen alone. We ” 

The door opened suddenly and Bill turned 
around with a start. But it was Rowson who came 
in, and alone. He was panting and he slammed 
the door quickly behind him and turned the key in 
the lock. They all stared at him in amazement. 

6o 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


“ What’s the matter? ” demanded Nichols. 

“ Chanler’s got a lot of sophomores together and 
they’re having a hazing party down back of the 
chapel. They catch the fellows coming up from 
recitations and keep them there doing stunts. I 
think they got Burnet, but I ran and got away.” He 
stopped to catch his breath, leaning against the door. 

“ It won’t do any good to lock the door,” de- 
clared Robertson, going over and turning the key 
again. “ If they come looking for anybody they’ll 
know we’re here just the minute they find the door 
locked, and then they’ll smash it down if we don’t 
let ’em in.” 

“We can go into the bedroom,” said Nichols. 
“ They won’t be likely to look in there. I guess we’d 
better not wait any longer for Burnet. If he gets 
away he ought to know where to find us.” 

Bill almost smiled with satisfaction. Butt was 
doing his duty, and all was well. 

Robertson’s was one of the few rooms in the 
Dorms with a small sleeping room adjoining. Into 
this they now trooped, closing the door behind them. 
Bill curled himself up on the farthest corner of the 
bed, and the others arranged themselves where they 
could. As befitted the leader, Nichols kept the floor. 

“ I’m sorry Burnet isn’t here, because he’s 
pretty good at planning,” he began, “ but I guess 
we can get along. The first thing we want to do 
6i 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


is to get hold of McCarthy. That oughtn’t to be 
so very hard, because he’s sure to be around the 
Dorms somewhere, but the trouble will be to catch 
him alone. He thinks this is my room here, because 
he found me here last night, so he told me to be 
here, sure, at nine o’clock. But he’ll have somebody 
with him.” 

“ Don’t you room in the Dorms? ” asked Bill. 

“ No, I’ve got a room uptown.” 

“Why not let him go there for you? There 
wouldn’t be so many around,” suggested Robertson. 

“ That would be all right if he were coming 
around alone, but I don’t think he is. He tried to 
manage me alone last night, and I don’t think he’ll 
try it again.” 

A smile flickered over Bill’s face, safely con- 
cealed behind Robertson’s back. 

“ I don’t see how we’re going to make any defi- 
nite plans when we don’t know how many people 
he’s going to have with him,” objected Rowson 
querulously. 

“ I have an idea,” suggested Bill. It had been 
striking him more and more strongly that this wasn’t 
a very brave lot of conspirators after all. With the 
exception of Robertson and Burnet, who, according 
to Butt, was all right, they seemed to be nothing 
more than a bunch of sore-heads, without the ability 
to lay a real plan or the courage to carry it out. 

62 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


For an instant he was tempted to reveal what he 
was, express his disgust with them and tell them 
they were a lot of silly fools. But he decided that 
that would be letting Nichols off too easily. 

“ Let’s have it then,” said Nichols shortly. 

“ You know I room in a private house myself — 
Mrs. Sleeper’s, the little brown house just across 
the street down the hill. McCarthy was going to 
have some fun with me last night, but I skipped 
away from him, and I have an idea he’ll be 
around to see me to-night. I don’t imagine he’s 
afraid of me, and I shouldn’t wonder if he came 
alone.” 

“ Just the thing: we’ll all be there! ” exclaimed 
Nichols. 

“No! — my landlady wouldn’t stand for any 
rumpus in the house. But you can be outside and 
get him when he comes out.” 

“ But suppose he brings some one with him? ” 
asked Rowson. 

“ He won’t bring the whole class with him,” 
put in Robertson. “ I guess with seven of us we 
can manage two or three extra ones — half a dozen, 
if necessary. We’re a lot of poor sticks if we can’t.” 

“ S-sh! Some one’s coming! ” interrupted Row- 

son. 

Nichols opened the door a crack and peered into 
the study. 


^3 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Oh, It’s you, is it? Come on in. It’s Burnet,” 
he added in explanation. 

Bill crouched farther back in his corner, doing 
his best to hide behind Robertson. 

“ Well, what’s the scheme? ” asked Burnet, clos- 
ing the door behind him. 

“ We’ve got it all fixed up,” began Nichols 
enthusiastically. “ Bill is going to have him down 
at his room and ” 

‘‘Bill? Bill who?” 

“ That Bill over there. McCarthy’s going down 
to his room, and we’re all going to be waiting out- 
side and nab him when he comes out. Then we’ll 
take him in hand and give him what’s coming to 
him. We won’t need any plan for that: all we want 
is to get hold of him.” 

It was no use trying to hide any longer. Bill 
knew that Burnet had moved so as to get a look at 
him, and all the time Nichols was speaking he knew 
it was only a question of seconds before the cat was 
hopelessly out of the bag. He was right. The last 
word was hardly out of Nichols’s mouth when Bur- 
net spoke. 

“ You are a prize lot! ” he cried. “ Don’t you 
know one of your own class when you see him?” 
From where he was lying Bill could not see Burnet, 
but he could see Nichols and a sudden startled 
expression that came over his face. “ Here you 

64 


TRAILING A FRESHMAN 


are plotting against a sophomore/’ Burnet went on, 
“ with one of them, right ” 

He got no farther. With a heavy lunge that 
sent a pile of books clattering to the floor, Nichols 
bolted for the door. 

“ They’re coming! They mustn’t see us togeth- 
er I ” he cried, running through the study. The 
others followed, startled and wondering. Bill last 
of all. When he reached the hall Burnet was the 
only one in sight. 

“ There’s no one here 1 ” Burnet exclaimed. “ I 
wonder why he did that?” 

“ I wonder,” Bill echoed. And he really did. 


CHAPTER IV 


THE OUTCOME 


ORTUNE, in the shape of Nichols, had un- 



accountably saved Bill from disclosure for the 


time being, and he saw no reason to think 
that the freshmen who had been in Robertson’s room 
were suspicious of him. But it was no fault of 
Burnet’s that the whole business was not hopelessly 
spoiled, and Bill knew that Nichols’s sudden break- 
ing up of the meeting had only postponed revelations 
till Burnet should have another chance to talk with 
his fellow-conspirators. 

They stood in the empty hall, the freshman and 
the sophomore, looking at each other and wonder- 
ing. Bill was inclined to be amused, but Burnet saw 
nothing but the utmost seriousness in the turn things 
had taken. 

“ If you don’t mind, I wish you’d take a little 
walk with me,” said Bill, smiling. 

“ Where to? ” Burnet’s tone was a shade sus- 
picious. 

“ Oh, anywhere. Down to my room, perhaps. 
We might as well go there as anywhere.” 


66 


THE OUTCOME 


‘‘ You want to get me out of the way, so I 
won’t tell those fellows what I started to, don’t 
you? ” 

“ Yes — incidentally. But more than that, I want 
to have a little talk with you.” 

“ We can talk up in my room.” 

“ I know, but we might be interrupted. I wish 
you’d do as I ask ! I’m not talking to you now as a 
sophomore to a freshman. I understand you’ve 
pledged Kappa Chi. That’s my fraternity, too — I 
guess you knew it. You and I ought to be good 
friends, then, and it’s on that basis I want to talk 
with you. If there is any need to order you around 
as a freshman, some one else will have to do it.” 

” All right. I’ll come,” and they started down 
the stairs. Burnet did not say a word all the way 
to Mrs. Sleeper’s, but there was plainly something 
on his mind. Once he even opened his mouth to 
speak, and then thought better of it. But they were 
hardly in Bill’s room before he blurted it out. 

“ What are you mixed up in this thing for? ” he 
asked. 

“ That’s the very thing I was going to ask you.” 

“ I asked first.” 

“ All right. McCarthy got wind that Nichols 
had some kind of a scheme on, though he didn’t 
know he was going to figure so prominently in it 
himself, and he asked me if I couldn’t find out what 
67 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


it was. It was easier for me to do it because I’m 
a new man and there was a chance that I could pass 
myself off for a freshman without being found out. 
I did it for the fun of the thing at first, but I’m 
interested now, and I’m going to see it through.” 

“ Do you think you’re acting fair? ” 

“ Of course ! You know that old chestnut about 
everything’s being fair in war — and when freshmen 
rebel against the divine right of sophomores I think 
you can call it war.” 

“ I suppose you call that class spirit! ” 

“ In a way, though I haven’t got a great deal of 
class spirit yet — not the real thing. You see, I’ve 
only been a member of this class for about a day.” 
“ Is it because you’re a friend of McCarthy’s? ” 
“ More or less. I don’t know McCarthy very 
well, but I like him. Still, that isn’t all. But haven’t 
you been cross-examining me long enough for a 
while? You might tell me why you’re in it — and 
you might as well sit down as stand up.” 

Bill threw himself on the couch, but Burnet re- 
mained standing. 

“ I’m in it because McCarthy hasn’t acted right,” 
he cried. “ He’s mean and he’s a coward! ” 

“ What has he done to you? ” 

“ Nothing. But that’s only because he happened 
to pick out somebody else. Nobody but a mean 
coward would do what he did to Nichols last night.” 

68 


THE OUTCOME 

Bill grinned. 

“ But I thought Nichols rather got* the best of 
it. That’s what he says, anyway.” 

“ Oh, I know Nick is a sort of a blower, and he 
likes to hear himself talk. But you ought to have 
seen him when he got back this morning.” 

“ You ought to have seen McCarthy, for that 
matter. Is Nichols a special friend of yours? ” 

“No: it’s just the principle of the thing.” 

“ Then you’re acting out of class spirit, too.” 

“ Yes — and college spirit. It’s a disgrace to 
Tresham College to have things happening like what 
happened last night ! A man like McCarthy ought 
to be taught a lesson.” 

“ If you lived in Russia you’d be an anarchist, 
Burnet,” Bill remarked, going over to his desk for 
his pipe, which he proceeded to fill and light as he 
talked. “ Well ! When you get to talking about 
principles, I don’t know. As a matter of fact, I 
can’t see such an awful lot of use in hazing anyway. 
Sometimes it’s funny, and once in a while it puts a 
damper on a man that’s too fresh. But I don’t see 
that it does an awful lot of harm either. That 
Nichols business last night was a little more stren- 
uous than usual, perhaps, but he wasn’t obliged to 
stand for it. I think you’re wrong when you say 
McCarthy’s mean and a coward. I haven’t seen 
anything of that sort in him at all. All you know 
6 69 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


about him is what you’ve heard from Nichols, and 
you must admit that Nichols is prejudiced. And I 
can see without any trouble at all just how Nichols 
made McCarthy feel.” 

“ How’s that?” 

“ He was nasty. That doesn’t go with McCar- 
thy, you know. Mac’s an Irishman, and he’s got an 
Irishman’s temper. If Nichols had acted like other 
freshmen he’d have been all right. That’s one thing 
I don’t understand about Nichols — why he didn’t 
act like other freshmen. Because he hasn’t got an 
ounce of nerve. I watched him a good deal this 
afternoon, and I sized him up as a big, sneaky 
coward. He’s sore because McCarthy did get the 
best of him last night, in spite of all his big talk, 
and because he has a nasty disposition he wants to 
get even. He doesn’t dare try to do it alone, so 
he gets half a dozen other sore-heads to help him 
out, and tries to get his man in the dark, with every 
odd in his own favor.” 

Burnet merely shrugged. 

“ That’s why I don’t understand why you’re hav- 
ing anything to do with it,” Bill went on. “ I don’t 
think it’s like you. I do understand, though, in a 
way. You think it’s a matter of principle, and that 
Nichols is in the right. That’s the way Robertson 
feels about it, too, I imagine. But the rest of them 
— that Rowson is just a sniveling little ’fraid-cat, 
70 


THE OUTCOME 


and the other two — I don’t even know their names — 
are nothing but a couple of weaklings that a man 
like Nichols can wind right ’round his finger. They’d 
follow me just as quick if I threw a lot of big talk at 
them. They just sat around this afternoon without 
saying a word and listened to the one that made the 
biggest noise. When you get mixed up with people 
like that I don’t think the principle pulls so strong. 
As far as this thing goes, the principle doesn’t 
amount to a rap. It’s just something Nichols has 
used to rope in you and Robertson. He had the 
sense to want two decent men in his crowd anyway, 
and that’s the way he took to get them. But if you 
stick by him, you’ll see I’m right about him and his 
principles. I’m willing to bet on that.” 

Still Burnet did not speak. He just looked at 
Bill, and whatever he may have been thinking, his 
face gave no sign. Bill took a last pull at his pipe 
and knocked the ashes out. 

“ Why don’t you drop it, Burnet? It’s sure to 
leak out, and it’s going to do the freshmen that are 
in it a lot more harm than good.” 

“Why?” 

“ Because Nichols is the ring-leader, and because 
he’s the kind of man he is.” 

Burnet still looked at him thoughtfully. 

“What are you going to do?” he asked at 
length. 


71 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ I don’t know exactly, except that I’m going to 
have Mac down here according to agreement. What 
happens then will depend on Mac and Chanler and 
whoever else they choose to have around. I imagine 
Mr. Nichols won’t indulge in any more rebellion 
right away.” 

Burnet straightened up and threw back his head, 
as if he had come to a decision. 

“ You may be right about Nichols — I hadn’t 
thought that way, but I can see why you do. I’ll 
tell you what I’ll do. If you’ll drop out of the 
thing right now, I will.” 

“ Why not anyway? I oughtn’t to make any dif- 
ference.” 

“ Well, Nichols is depending on me. You’re on 
the other side, so if we both drop out that 
evens things up. Besides, if you don’t do any- 
thing, their plan won’t work, the way they have it 
fixed now, and they may give up the whole 
thing.” 

Bill shook his head. 

“ No, I have a personal interest now. I want 
to see Freshman Nichols get what you might call 
a much-needed lesson — just in the interests of hu- 
manity. Of course you can tell them about me. I 
suppose you will. I shan’t try to stop you. But, 
whether you do or not, and whether this affair to- 
night comes off or not, I think Nichols has already 
72 


THE OUTCOME 


got himself in deep enough so that he’ll realize it 
before he’s through.” 

Burnet hesitated a moment. 

‘‘ All right,” he said. “ I guess we’ll have to 
let it go at that,” and he left the room. 

He went straight to the Dorms, intending to 
find the conspirators and show them, if he could, 
that they, perhaps, were not following the way of 
wisdom. What Bill had said had shown him a 
somewhat different point of view. But the conspira- 
tors were strangely elusive. Robertson was not in 
his room, nor was Rowson, nor the two others. 
He did not know where Nichols roomed, so he could 
not look there. At supper-time he gave up the 
search, puzzled and wondering. 

He would have wondered still more if he could 
have known that immediately after he and Bill had 
left the Dorms Nichols had got the other four to- 
gether again — he looked for Bill, too, but Bill had 
disappeared — and told them they had better leave 
Burnet out of all further plans. His reasons were 
rather vague. It seemed that he had discovered 
Burnet could not be wholly trusted or something like 
that, and he urged his followers to keep out of 
Burnet’s way till the whole business was over. They 
were somewhat mystified at this sudden change, but 
the time was short and it was not difficult to do as 
Nichols wished. They spent the rest of the after- 
73 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


noon and the early part of the evening in Nichols’s 
room uptown. 

Bill, after Burnet had gone, propped himself 
up on his couch so he could look out of the window, 
filled his pipe again, and lay there, smoking and 
gazing off at the western hills. He expected Butt 
or Mac would drop in before long to hear his re- 
port. 

Well, he had found out what they wanted to 
know, and it had been fun in a way. But the whole 
thing was pretty trivial, he reflected, a mean-spirited 
man seeking a petty revenge in a cheap, melodra- 
matic way. It seemed more like an episode from 
one of the Frank Merriwell tales he used to read in 
his boyhood than the doings of real people in a 
real college. He was almost inclined to hunt up 
Nichols and tell him he was a fool, and that the only 
sensible thing for him to do was to swallow his 
grievances if he had any, and let bygones alone. 
But the very fact that Nichols, being the spiritless 
kind of man he plainly was, should have the audacity 
to adopt such blood-and-thunder methods, was a 
puzzle that had interest enough to make Bill decide 
to let things take their own course. At the worst, 
it was just a waste of time. 

An hour passed, and it was after five o’clock. 
Neither Butt nor McCarthy had shown up yet, and 
feeling a desire for company. Bill scrawled a hurried 
74 


THE OUTCOME 


note on his desk pad, telling where he had gone, and 
went over to the Kappa Chi house. 

Weird sounds from within assailed his ears even 
before he reached the door, and he entered the 
parlor to find Hawkins and Durham seated at the 
piano, engaged in executing a song called, “ Wait 
till the sun shines, Nelly.” Hawkins knew two sets 
of chords, which he used impartially as an accom- 
paniment to their singing. And the singing ! It was 
plain now what Colchester had been led to expect 
from Hawkins’s warning that Bill was about as 
much of a singer as Bull Durham. 

Gray lay on the window seat, doubled up with 
laughing. He beckoned Bill to come over beside 
him, but it was useless to try to speak until the up- 
roar was finished. The two singers kept on, heed- 
less of everything but their song, and ended with a 
burst of long-drawn-out fervor: 

“Wait till the sun shines, Nelly, 

By-y a-and by-y. ” 

Hawkins gave a final thump to the keys and 
swung around on the piano stool. 

“ Hello, Old Sleuth! Pretty good, eh, what? ” 
he cried. “ I guess the Kappa Chi brethren are the 
original songbirds this year, all right.” 

Durham grinned placidly. 

75 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ We’re going out for the Glee Club, too,” he 
remarked. 

“ Sure we are. I guess Bull and I have as strong 
a pull with Tod Smith as you and Butt Chanler 
have. We can lick him, anyway.” 

“ How did Chanler come out? ” asked Bill. 

“ Shucks, Bill! Call him ‘ Butt ’ 1 We’ll kick 
you out if you go to calling us by our last names 
around here.” 

“ How did Butt come out, then? ” Bill repeated, 
laughing. 

“ Oh, they told him he’d get a second trial and 
it’s gone to his head. He’s been up in Effie Col- 
chester’s room for the last half hour, torturing that 
poor mandolin of his. He’s getting ready for the 
Mandolin Club trials. Between his playing up there 
and our singing down here everybody else has been 
driven out of the house except Tommy. Tommy 
likes it — he think it’s funny.” 

“ Do you suppose Butt would mind if I inter- 
rupted him? I want to see him a minute.” 

“ Of course not: come on up. We’ll all go up. 
It’s time he had an interruption.” 

And upstairs they went. From the front room 
issued the strains of a mandolin, going painstakingly 
over and over what sounded like a pretty difficult 
passage. 

“ That’s ‘ Silver Heels ’ he’s working on. I 

76 


THE OUTCOME 


thought you’d like to know,” remarked Hawkins, 
pausing outside the door. “ Wait a minute. He’ll 
get to the chorus after a while, and then perhaps 
you’ll recognize it.” 

They waited, listening, Durham and Hawkins 
close to the door, their fists raised ready to pound 
upon it. 

“Here she comes. Ready I ” Hawkins whis- 
pered, and as the mandolin swung into the chorus 
they lifted up their voices in a loud chant, pounding 
terrific time on the door-panel: 

Dum dee dee, de-dum dee dee. 

Pretty little Silver Heels, 

Dum dee dee, de-dum dee dee, 

If you will come and cook my meals.*’ 

“ Oh-h! ” screamed Butt from within. “ Come 
in or get out, but for Heaven’s sake shut up that 
racket! ” 

“ A gentleman to see you, Mr. Chanler,” an- 
nounced Hawkins, opening the door and pushing Bill 
forward. “ Remember your manners.” 

“Oh, hello. Bill!” Butt, flushed from his 
efforts, put down the mandolin and arose from his 
chair. “ I thought those wild Indians were going 
to smash in the door. I’ve been trying to work up 
this piece for the Mandolin Club trials, but there’s 
a place in the first part that I always trip up on.” 
77 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Be not discouraged, Buttle dear. Your lucky 
star is with you this day,” said Hawkins solemnly. 
“ If you can get by Tod Smith there isn’t anything 
more to be afraid of.” 

“Did you hear about that. Bill?” Butt fairly 
beamed. “ They’re going to give me a second trial 
an the Glee Club! ” 

“ Did he hear about that f ” echoed Hawkins 
and Durham in unison. “ Is there anybody in 
college that hasn’t heard about it?” added Haw- 
kins. 

“ We’re going to have an announcement made 
in chapel to-morrow morning,” said Durham. 
“ ‘ Notice is hereby given that the college is relieved 
of the responsibility of furnishing musical clubs this 
year, the brothers of the Kappk Chi fraternity hav- 
ing kindly consented to supply all the requisite ma- 
terial.’ Husky and I are going to help you and 
Bill and Effie on the Glee Club, and with you to play 
‘ Silver Heels ’ and Tommy Gray to be the Banjo 
Club, I don’t see where there’s room for anybody 
else.” 

“ Tommy really can play: he was on the Banjo 
Club last year,” supplemented Butt. 

“ ‘ Oh, we are a band of gay music-i-ans,’ ” car- 
rolled Hawkins, seizing the mandolin and twanging 
upon it. 

“ Here I ” Butt rescued his cherished instru- 

78 


THE OUTCOME 


merit and put it in its case. “ Why weren’t you 
down at football practice to-day? That’s the place 
to work off your exuberant spirits.” 

“Going out to-morrow, aren’t we, Bull? It’s 
too much to expect sophomores to go to football 
practice when they’ve had to be out hazing the night 
before.” 

“ Oh, Bill! ” cried Butt, remembering. “How 
about Mac’s conspiracy? Find out anything?” 

“ Yes. There is one all right. They’re going 
to take Mac out to-night and haze him.” 

“ Haze him? ” echoed Hawkins. “ Who? That 
fellow he was talking about this morning? Well, 
what do you know about that? ” 

“ I don’t know how it’ll come out now. I got 
in on the plotting and everything was fixed up fine, 
but Burnet walked in on us. He’s one of the plot- 
ters.” 

“ Bunny? I thought I had him corailed for a 
solid hour. I told the fellows not to let him get 
away no matter what happened.” 

“ He got away though, and caught me red- 
handed.” 

Did he hetr-ray yuh?^* demanded Hawkins 
in a melodramatic whisper. 

“ He was just going to, when all of a sudden 
Nichols gave a whoop and knocked over a pile of 
books and broke up the meeting. I haven’t seen any 
79 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

of them since, except Burnet. I took him down to 
the room and tried to tell him that wasn’t any gang 
for him to be traveling around with. But he’s a 
stubborn child. I suppose he’s told them I’m just a 
spying sophomore by this time.” 

“ Why didn’t you gag him and lock him up? ” 

“ What was the use ? I don’t want any fuss with 
Burnet, and besides, Nichols and his crowd are 
willing to furnish all that sort of thing that’s neces- 
sary.” 

“ What are they going to do? ” 

“ Well, Nichols has got four fellows together — 
besides Burnet. One of ’em, Robertson, isn’t a bad 
sort at all, but the other three are the limit. Mac 
sized up Nichols about right. He’s a squealer. I 
told ’em Mac was planning to haze me last night, 
but I got away from him, which was gospel truth, 
and that probably he’d pay me a visit to-night. Their 
scheme is to be waiting outside the house and catch 
him when he comes out. They count on his coming 
out alone.” 

Well, he won’t! ” cried Hawkins. 

“ But don’t you see they won’t try it now? They 
know we’re on to it. If they do anything at all 
they’ll wait till they think we don’t expect it.” 

“ Bull, I see where we don’t go out for football 
till next week! ” said Hawkins solemnly. “ We’ve 
got to put in another night showing freshmen what’s 
8o 


THE OUTCOME 


what, and I shouldn’t wonder if it was going to be 
a strenuous one.” 

“ You won’t do anything of the kind,” put in 
Butt. “ If Mac hadn’t tried that stunt last night 
there wouldn’t have been any trouble at all.” 

“Now look here. Butt! If that man Nichols 
couldn’t find trouble he’d make it. If he thinks 
he can try any of his sophomore-hazing games up 
here and get away with it, he’s got another think 
coming to him. I’m not much on hazing generally, 
but here’s a case where it’s necessary, and I’m for 
giving it to him good and plenty.” 

“Calm down, Husky! Listen here a minute. 
You know Prexy is dead against hazing anyway, and 
if anything happened to give him an excuse he’d put 
his foot down on it in a minute. I think he’s right 
about it. Oh, I know what you’re going to say! 
But you know it’s a nuisance and doesn’t do any 
good even in special cases. But I don’t want our 
class to be the one to give him an excuse. So far, 
he hasn’t had a single kick coming about the way 
we’ve done things, and I don’t want him to have. 
I’ll have a talk with Nichols and show him the way 
he’s doing is silly and ridiculous, and if he’s got any 
sense at all he’ll see it. But we won’t have any 
more night parties.” 

“ Far be it from me to rebel against the presi- 
dent of me class,” grumbled Hawkins. “ I wish 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


you luck. But it’s my humble opinion that Freshman 
Nichols needs a good thrashing.” 

“ Perhaps he does, but it isn’t up to us to give 
it to him. What do you think, Bill? ” 

“ Personally, Pd rather like to see him get the 
thrashing. There’s something about him that I 
don’t like at all. But I suppose you’re right.” 

“ There! ” cried Hawkins. “ Bill’s hob-nobbed 
with him and knows him, and he’s for the corporal 
punishment. I think Pll go along with you. Butt, 
and if your gentle words can’t do anything my strong 
right arm may come in handy.” 

“Here, you last year’s freshmen! Pd like to 
use my room a little while, if you don’t mind.” Col- 
chester stood in the doorway with another senior 
behind him. 

“ Oh, Effie, you’re a pig! ” cried Durham, who 
had fixed himself comfortably on the window-seat. 
“Can’t you see we’re using it? Butt’s having a 
class meeting.” 

“ It looks that way. No, Pm sorry, but Pd 
really like to have a little class meeting of my own 
here for a few minutes. Scoot! Oh, hello. Bill! ” 
he added, noticing Bill for the first time. “ Here, 
I want you to meet Mr. Meredith, the president of 
the senior class and probably one of the most prom- 
inent, if not the most prominent, men in college. 
Pardon me. Merry, before a poifect stranger, but I 
82 


THE OUTCOME 


do love to get that off. Bill’s a new brother of ours 
from out west — and Bill’s his last name, not his 
first.” 

While Bill and Meredith were shaking hands 
Hawkins sidled up to Colchester and put an arm 
coaxingly about him. 

“ Please, Effie, can’t you get Bull and me a 
place on the Glee Club, too? We love you just as 
much as Bill does, and we’ll run errands for you 
and carry your suitcase for you, and lend you clean 
collars ” 

“ That’ll be about enough from you about Glee 
Club, my boy! Tod Smith nearly didn’t give Bill 
a trial on the strength of your pleading. Trot along, 
now. Merry and I have work to do before supper.” 

“ It’s most supper time, anyway,” said Butt, 
leading the way into the hall. “ We’ll have just time 
to go up to the post office before grub.” 

On the way uptown Bill was on the lookout for 
some of the freshmen, who must by this time have 
been informed of his perfidy by Burnet, and after 
supper he and Butt strolled up to the Dorms on 
the same quest. They were looking especially for 
Nichols, for Butt had a little lecture all ready for 
that misguided freshman, and later on, at the gather- 
ing that is held in College Hall on the first Friday 
night after college opens to introduce the various 
undergraduate activities to the new men, they were 

83 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


as fully occupied in searching the audience as in 
listening to the speakers. Everyone was supposed 
to attend this affair, but Burnet seemed to be the 
only one of the conspirators present. He was sitting 
well down toward the front of the hall and they 
made no effort to get close to him. 

Nichols, as we know, had his four followers 
safely in his room, and there he meant to keep them 
till time for action. So far as they were aware, 
everything was still to go off as scheduled, and they 
intended to keep well out of the way of stray sopho- 
mores in the meantime. Robertson, to be sure, 
chafed somewhat under these precautions, and grum- 
bled at missing the meeting in College Hall, but 
the others agreed with Nichols, and his counsel pre- 
vailed. 

At nine o’clock they sallied forth, and by a round- 
about way came to the hedge that partially enclosed 
Mrs. Sleeper’s yard. Beneath this they could lie 
completely hidden, while a street lamp some thirty 
feet away made a circle of light on the sidewalk 
which gave them a good look at everyone coming 
from the direction of the college. There they waited, 
starting up eagerly at every sound of approaching 
footsteps. 

Bill’s was the first familiar form to appear in the 
flare of the street lamp — but he was not alone. His 
companion turned out to be Chanler. They won- 
84 


THE OUTCOME 


dered and whispered about it when the two had 
passed into the house. 

Burnet came next, hurrying, almost running, and 
they could hear him muttering with impatience be- 
cause he found the door locked and had to wait for 
some one to come and let him in. Nichols crouched 
farther into the hedge shadows, uttering a low 
“ S-sh ! ” of warning and command. When Burnet 
was finally admitted, he raised his head cautiously. 

“ Listen I ” he whispered. “ Can you hear me? 
When McCarthy comes we must get him before he 
goes in. We won’t wait till he comes out.” 

“ Why? ” demanded Rowson. 

“ Don’t speak so loud I ” 

“ But we want Bill and Burnet to help us I ” 

“ Keep still, will you? ” growled Robertson. “ If 
the five of us can’t take care of him we’d better sell 
out. Don’t you know Chanler’s there, too ? ” 

*‘S-sh! Some one’s coming!” They listened 
tensely, their eyes fixed on the point where the on- 
comer would first enter the circle of light. “ It’s 
him. Get ready! ” 

McCarthy it was, fresh from a nap that had 
lasted a good deal longer than he had intended. His 
alarm clock, set for six, had failed to awake him, 
and he might have slept on till morning if his room- 
mate had not roused him to demand the where- 
abouts of a missing sweater. He came walking 
7 85 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


briskly along, whistling shrilly, and turned in at 
Mrs. Sleeper’s front walk. His foot was just raised 
to mount the first step when a figure appeared at 
each side of him, each grasping an arm. He turned 
sharply, but the hands held tight. 

“ What’s the matter? ” he cried angrily. 

“ We want you,” came the short answer. 

‘‘Oh, it’s you, Nichols, is it? So this is your 
scheme! Well, what about it?” 

“ You might as well come along.” 

“Huh!” McCarthy laughed grimly, tried in 
vain to wrench himself free, and suddenly relaxed, 
making himself a dead weight on their hands. “ If 
you’re counting on getting me anywhere you’ll have 
to carry me.” 

“We can do it!” and McCarthy saw other 
quick-moving figures approach from out of the 
shadows. He could not count them, but he knew 
he was outnumbered. With a quick movement he 
straightened up and shouted: “ Bill ! Bill ! Bill ! ” 
Then an arm was thrown about his head, shutting 
off his cries. 

Upstairs, Bill and Butt were quietly chatting 
and smoking when Burnet suddenly burst in upon 
them. 

“Hello, Bunny!” exclaimed Butt, looking at 
the flushed freshman in surprise. “ Isn’t this pretty 
86 


THE OUTCOME 

late for a freshman to be out alone and un- 
protected? ” 

“Has McCarthy been here yet?” demanded 
Burnet. 

“ No. What’s the trouble? ” 

Burnet sat down and mopped his forehead with 
his handkerchief. 

“ Nothing, now. Only I’ve been thinking over 
this thing, and the more I think, the foolisher it 
seems. I tried to find the other fellows and tell 
them it was nothing to do at all, but they haven’t 
been in their rooms and they weren’t at the meeting 
to-night, and somehow everything seemed so mud- 
dled up that I got afraid you might not have seen 
McCarthy and you might not be here when he came 
down, and then the whole thing would go through 
just as they planned it.” 

“ Then you haven’t had a chance to betray me 
yet? ” asked Bill with a smile. 

“No: I haven’t seen any of them since they 
rushed out of Robertson’s room this afternoon.” 

“ It looks as though Nichols didn’t want your 
thrilling news. They’re probably hiding somewhere 
outside now, but I don’t think they’ll do much to- 
night. I didn’t see Mac.” 

“ You didn’t? ” Burnet started from his chair. 
“ Then they’ll get him! ” 

“ How can they? ” Bill struck a match and 

87 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


held it poised between his fingers. “ I was going 
to deliver him into their hands, but I didn’t get a 

chance to invite him down. It’s possible ” He 

paused to apply the match to his pipe, but stopped 
short in the middle of the first puff. From the 
front of the house came suddenly Mac’s thrice re- 
peated cry. “By golly! They have! Here — 
you can’t see the street from that window — the tree’s 
in the way. Hurry up! ” and he dashed out the 
door and down the stairs. “ Oh, thunder! ” he cried 
in exasperation. The hall light had been put out, 
and in the dark he fumbled in vain at the combina- 
tion of chain-bolt, ordinary bolt and key with which 
Mrs. Sleeper safeguarded the entrance to her house 
at night. Butt and Burnet were already at his 
back, urging him to hurry. “ Light a match, for 
Heaven’s sake! ” 

A light appeared at the other end of the 
hall, and Mrs. Sleeper came pattering barefooted 
toward them, a strange apparation in curl-papers, 
wrapped in a quilt and bearing a lamp aloft in her 
hand. 

“Mr. Bill! What’s the matter? Dear me, 
what’s the matter?” 

“ Oh, won’t you unlock this confounded thing, 
please? I can’t make head nor tail of it! ” 

“ But what’s the matter? I heard some one yell- 
in’ bloody murder, and ” 


88 



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THE OUTCOME 


“ Please won’t you open the door? ” interrupted 
Butt. 

Mrs. Sleeper drew herself up very straight, look- 
ing down at Butt with kindling eyes. Then she 
deliberately placed the lamp on the hall table and 
took her stand beside it, drawing the quilt more 
closely about her and folding her arms resolutely. 

“ Mr. Bill I Mr. Bill ! she repeated, for Bill 
was busy with the door and paid no attention to her 
first call. He turned impatiently. “ If there’s one 
thing I pride myself on, it’s treatin’ my boarders 
right,” she declared impressively. “ Land knows, 
I don’t have to take in boarders, and I ain’t never 
done it since Mr. Sleeper passed away. But now 
that I have taken you in, I mean to do as well by 
you as I know how. I want any boarder of mine 

should have as nice a time as anybody. But 

She paused, picked up her lamp again as she neared 
her climax, and drew herself up a little straighten 
Bill, held by her stern eye, sighed resignedly, though 
his hand itched to get at the door again. He 
had got it nearly unlocked. “ But,” she repeated, 
“ I’m not going to put up with people cornin’ in 
here to see you and then interruptin’ and insultin’ 
mel^’ 

“ Oh, Mrs. Sleeper, I didn’t think of insulting 
you! ” protested Butt. “ I didn’t mean to interrupt 
you, but we’re in such an awful hurry — that was 
89^ 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

one of our friends yelling. Some freshmen have got 
him, and they’re going to haze him.” 

“ Freshmen hazin^f I never heard of such a 
thing! ” she cried incredulously. 

“ But they are 1 They’re a mean lot and they 
may hurt him.” 

“ Did you ever! I always said this hazin’ had 
ought to be put a stop to. Here, let me get at that 
door! ” With swift fingers she undid the lock, her 
wrath all forgotten. “ I hope you get ’em and 
trounce ’em good. Poor boy! If ” 

But they were gone, leaving her with her sen- 
tence unfinished. 

In vain they looked up and down the street and 
searched around the house. The delay had been 
enough and McCarthy and his captors had disap- 
peared completely. 

The three stopped under the street lamp, look- 
ing undecidedly at one another. 

“ They can’t have gone far,” said Bill. “ They 
probably had to carry him.” 

“ Here’s a chance to do some sleuthing,” sug- 
gested Butt. 

“ P-sh! What can I do — at night? That was 
just showing off this morning. I wish I could, 
though.” 

“ Don’t you know where they were going to 
take him? ” 


90 


THE OUTCOME 


“No! I didn’t suppose they’d get him, so I 
didn’t try to find out. Don’t you know, Burnet? ” 

“ No: they talked a lot of stuff about teaching 
him a lesson, but I didn’t pay much attention to all 
that. I thought they’d really get down to business 
this afternoon.” 

“ Well ” Butt started to move along. “ We 

ought to be doing something, but what in thunder 
can we do ? ” 

“ Maybe they weren’t all there,” suggested Bur- 
net. “ I tell you. I’ll go up to the Dorms and see 
if one of ’em isn’t there, and find out where the rest 
were going.” 

“ We’ll go along with you,” said Butt. 

But none of those they were looking for was 
to be found in the Dorms. Many of the freshmen 
had gone to bed. It was understood by both classes 
that hazing was to be generally cut out after the 
first night — and only in one room did they come 
upon any sophomores. 

“ Had I better tell them? ” asked Butt as they 
stood in the doorway. “ They might help us 
hunt.” 

“ I wouldn’t. They probably couldn’t do any 
more than we can alone, and I don’t imagine Mac 
would be crazy about having any more people know 
about it than have to.” 

“ All right.” Butt closed the door again. “ I 

91 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


guess you’d better go to bed, Bunny. There isn’t 
anything you can do.” 

“ I’d like to help,” said Burnet in a troubled 
voice. “ You know I sort of feel partly to blame 
for this. I was going in on it, too.” 

“ Oh, that’s all right. I’d get some sleep if I 
were you. You’ll have a good deal to do to-morrow, 
with the flag-rush and things.” 

So Burnet said good night and left them. 

“ Can you think of anything? ” asked Butt when 
he had gone. 

“ Nothing that’ll help Mac. I’m going to wait 
up in Robertson’s room till he gets back.” 

“ All right. If we can’t do anything else, we 
can at least send him to bed with something to think 
about.” 

They did not light up in Robertson’s room, but 
sat there in the dark. They expected a rather long 
wait — it was only a little after ten o’clock — and 
Butt curled himself up in a big Morris chair to get a 
short nap. But he had hardly begun to doze when 
Robertson came in. They did nat speak, and he 
had lighted his desk lamp before he saw that they 
were there. 

‘‘ Back early, aren’t you? ” Bill remarked, rising 
and going over to the door, where he stood with his 
back against it, ready to prevent any attempt of 
Robertson’s to leave the room. 

92 


THE OUTCOME 


Robertson looked from one to the other, puzzled 
to find Bill there with a sophomore. 

“ What are you doing here? ” he asked. 

“ Just waiting for you. We want to hear about 
it.” 

Robertson gave a hitch to his shoulder, which 
was his way of shrugging. IVe washed my hands 
of it,” he said shortly. 

‘‘Why?” 

“ Because I don’t like it. There’s something 
queer about that man Nichols. You know the way 
he ran out of the room this afternoon? Then he 
suddenly took a notion not to have anything more 
to do with Burnet — he had us up in his room all the 
evening so Burnet couldn’t find us — and Burnet was 
the best fellow in the bunch. The rest aren’t any 
good.” 

“ What did you get mixed up in it for, then? ” 

“ Well, McCarthy was disagreeable, and it was 
the principle of the thing. But they weren’t think- 
ing anything about principle; they were just sore, 
and they wanted somebody to get back at. They 
thought it was smart, too.” 

“ Where are they now? ” 

“ Down back of the old Gym. But what’s the 
matter with you? You were as strong for it as 
anybody this afternoon.” 

Bill gave a little dry cough. 

93 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ I wasn’t really. I was just nosing around to 
find out what was doing. To tell the truth, I — I 
don’t happen to be a freshman. I’m a sophomore.” 

Robertson stared. 

“ You lied, then ! ” 

“ Perhaps so. But I didn’t say I was a fresh- 
man. I just tried to act like one.” 

“ Well, I don’t care anyhow. I suppose you’ll 
have it in for me now ” — he half turned to Butt — 
“ but I don’t care much about that either. I’m 
sick of this scrapping and fooling around. That 
isn’t what I came to college for. But I don’t envy 
Nichols much when McCarthy gets a chance at 
him.” 

“ What have they been doing to him? ” 

“ Jawing and pounding him. They don’t dare 
let him up. They’ve got him tied.” 

“ Come on. Bill I ” cried Butt. 

They ran all the way to the old Gym, Butt in 
the lead, and as they rounded the corner they caught 
a glimpse of fleeing figures disappearing around the 
other side. By the big electric light that illumined 
that end of the campus they could see another figure 
lying on the ground and some one standing over him. 
It was Nichols. 

“ Why didn’t you run, too? ” panted Butt, scorn- 
fully, running up to him. 

Nichols started slightly, and then grinned. 

94 


THE OUTCOME 


Why should I ? ” he said jauntily. “ You can’t 
do anything to me — not even if you get the whole 
class to back you up.” 

“ I guess we can, and we won’t need the whole 
class to help either.” Butt and Bill leaned over 
and began to unfasten the ropes that tied McCarthy. 

“ No, you can’t,” Nichols laughed, as if it were 
the best of jokes — Do you know why? Because 
I happen to be a sophomore, too ! ” 

Butt whirled around on him. 

What ? You — you ” Words failed him. 

“ Yes, I am. You can look it up on the regis- 
trar’s list if you don’t believe it. Burnet knows. He 
tried to tell, but I wasn’t ready to have people know 
yet.” 

“Then what — what are you doing this for?” 

“ For the fun of it — and I’ve had fun, too. You 
fellows are so smart here, you think anybody can’t 
be new without being a freshman ! This man ” — 
indicating McCarthy with his foot — “ thought he 
knew it all. He thought he’d have some fun with 
me ! But I guess he’s got his ! ” 

Butt looked at him contemptuously. 

“ I certainly am proud to have you in my class ! ” 
he said witheringly. 

McCarthy had succeeded in getting free of his 
bonds and standing up, though his mouth was still 
gagged. With an inarticulate roar he rushed at 
95 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Nichols, striking him a straight-armed blow on the 
chin that laid him flat. 

“ There ! ’’ he panted, flinging off the gag. “ Get 
up, and I’ll give you another! ” 

“ Here, Mac! ” cried Bill, seizing his arm. 

“ Let go of me ! ” McCarthy shook himself 
free and stood waiting with fists clenched. But 
Nichols did not get up. 

Butt knelt down beside him. 

“ He isn’t hurt,” he said. “ But let him alone. 
Fighting won’t do any good. Look here, Nichols! 
Are you listening?” 

“ Yes,” said Nichols in a muffled voice. 

You’re a pretty big fool, but you’ll be a bigger 
one if you tell anybody about this. I want a talk 
with you some time, but now you’d better get up and 
go home.” 

He got up, but Nichols made no move to rise. 

“Oh, leave him there!” said McCarthy dis- 
gustedly, turning away. 

“ Understand? ” demanded Butt. 

But Nichols made no answer, and they left him 
there. 


CHAPTER V 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 

S TRANGELY enough, all these happenings 
failed to leak out for some little time. Mc- 
Carthy did not want people to know of them, 
for very good reasons, and the other sophomores 
kept silent for his sake; Nichols still had enough 
influence among those freshmen who would have 
been likely to tell to seal their lips for the time 
being. 

So Nichols appeared the next morning in the 
sophomore seats in chapel, without being noticed 
particularly. He was a new man, that was all, and 
the fact that very few people knew of his brief 
masquerading as a freshman enabled him to slip 
! into his proper place without exciting any question. 

' He appeared in the sophomore ranks in the flag- 
' rush, and even fought as valiantly as a not over- 
! courageous man may, hoping thereby to retrieve 
I himself in the eyes of his class president. For Butt’s 
I words, even more than McCarthy’s blow, had set 
I him to thinking that his little joke had been undiplo- 

I 97 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

matic, to put it mildly, and he was anxious to make 
up for it. 

As far as Butt was concerned, however, he ap- 
parently did not exist, and Nichols had an uncom- 
fortable feeling that there was a general conspiracy 
among his new classmates to ignore him altogether. 
But in so thinking he was rather exaggerating his 
own importance, for with the exception of the Kappa 
Chi fellows and McCarthy, he was simply some one 
whom no one knew yet. 

Bill, however, was already known throughout 
the class, and for a very similar reason to the one 
that kept Nichols unknown — that he had played 
freshman for a little time. But there was a differ- 
ence, for the tale of his foolery could be told with- 
out embarrassment to any one, and Hawkins was as 
ready as the next man to laugh at the part that was 
considered a good joke on him. 

Besides, Bill had the advantage of being intro- 
duced into the class life by Butt Chanler, which 
meant a good deal in the class of Noughty-Even, 
and his little efforts at sleuthing, which Hawkins 
magnified into something quite wonderful in his re- 
peated tellings of them, gave him an individuality and 
a nickname, which also tends to help one in get- 
ting known. “ Old Slouch ” was what they called 
him, and he got the reputation of sleeping with a 
copy of Sherlock Holmes under his pillow, which 
98 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


was nonsense, but made him pointed out as a char- 
acter. Fellows even brought harmless little mysteries 
for him to solve, which he did, \Yith the superior 
air of the typical book hero, and by refusing to tell 
how he did it, which was by simply using common 
sense, he got a reputation for being very clever 
indeed. 

“ You’re an awful bluffer. Bill,” Butt told him 
one day. “ Aren’t you ashamed sometimes to string 
these innocents so? ” 

“ They like it,” Bill answered seriously. “ You’ll 
notice it’s only the innocents that take any stock in 
it, and it would spoil all the fun for them if I told 
them how I did it. Besides, I couldn’t tell them it’s 
just using common sense. They’d see then that 
they haven’t any, and they wouldn’t like that. 
They’re the kind of people one Mr. Barnum called 
suckers, and being fooled is the biggest fun they 
have.” 

Which proves that in his youthful way Bill was 
a practical philosopher. 

All this, however, was merely incidental. Bill 
was starting in this new year determined to wipe 
out the unfortunate impression his freshman year 
had made on his father, and that meant that he 
had real work to do. He was bright enough, and 
when he set out to do good work he could do it. 
But the old habits were hard to get away from, and 

99 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


many an evening when he sat doggedly at his desk 
it would have taken very little to make him heave 
his books into a corner and throw up the whole thing. 
Then came in the mutual disciplining which the 
Kappa Chi sophomores had reduced to such a sys- 
tem, for when Bill sometimes did heave the books 
into the corner and went to the house in search of 
some one to loaf or frolic with, they would tell him 
to go about his business, really meaning it. All 
of which made Bill sore for the time being, and he 
would go away in a state of righteous wrath, calling 
them a set of greasy grinds, who took it upon them- 
selves to manage what was no concern of theirs at 
all. But these fits of wrath always passed, and he 
came at length to admit that this high-handed prac- 
tice, unusual as it was, was at the same time rather 
a good thing. At any rate, he ceased to struggle 
against it and did not carry out his threat of seeking 
companions that weren’t so fussy, with the result 
that his father began to believe again that his eldest 
son might turn out to be something besides a scat- 
terbrain after all. 

But Bill’s studying and getting his lessons, 
though a very excellent thing, is not the point of 
this story, and it is alluded to merely to indicate 
that such things were daily features of his life — 
something that the reader might not be blamed for 
forgetting at times. 


lOO 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


His first weeks in Tresham were filled princi- 
pally with getting acquainted. His acquaintances 
were many. They extended pretty generally through 
his own class, with occasional incursions among the 
freshmen and juniors, and even among the seniors 
in his own house. But not so many of them ripened 
into friendship, for in spite of all of his ready min- 
gling with whatever people he was thrown with. Bill 
was not a fellow to rush into a great number of 
intimacies. Outside the men in the house, Mc- 
Carthy was almost the only one in his own class 
for whom he grew to care especially, and Mac was 
a person of erratic ways, who came often and stayed 
away long, according to a fashion all his own, and 
Bill could not have claimed him as a special crony. 
Among the juniors the ones he knew best were Don- 
nel and Crane, two fellows who were neither of 
them notable in any particular way, but just lika- 
ble. Perhaps the chief thing he liked about Crane 
was the genial way in which he poked fun at the 
detective stunts, for he appreciated just how much 
of them were pure bluff. But while he was laughing 
at them, he took delight in adding touches that made 
Bill’s solutions more mysterious than ever, and many 
a gullible “ innocent ” was convinced that Bill was 
a veritable wonder merely by the half serious mud- 
dles that Crane led them into. And he was the one 
who christened Bill “ Old Slouch.” 


lOI 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Bill had taken a fancy to Burnet, too, from the 
night when he hazed him, but he found that for 
the present to be intimate with a freshman was not 
considered the proper thing. Burnet had a period 
of probation to go through, as a prospective mem- 
ber of the Kappa Chi fraternity, and it was the 
policy of the brothers to ignore him when they 
were not impressing him with the fact that he was 
nothing but an insignificant freshman, and until this 
was over and he was finally initiated Bill had to do 
likewise. 

Chanler, Gray, Hawkins, and Durham were the 
four whom he saw the most and who became his 
closest friends. He found that on the whole they 
were as good fellows as he had ever known. Chan- 
lePs one fault was that he had got the habit of 
leadership, and whatever came along he was inclined 
to take hold of it and run it to suit himself. But 
that was not such a bad fault after all, for Butt 
was a good leader, and he was not objectionable 
about it. 

Gray was preeminently a follower, quiet, un- 
original, and altogether a very comfortable person 
to have around. Hawkins and Durham, whom Bill 
did not see quite so much of now because they were 
giving about all of their spare time to the football 
team, gave the impression of being just the opposite. 
Each in his own way, they seemed to be about as 


102 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


independent as possible — Hawkins with a good deal 
of noise and bluster, and Durham in a good-natured, 
easy-going fashion that nevertheless seemed just as 
immovable. But Bill came to see that when it got 
right down to business Butt managed them just as 
effectively as he did Gray, which made Bill smile 
to himself, for either one of them could have taken 
Butt and tossed him out the window without even 
exerting himself. 

So, among these people, the days of early autumn 
passed, and Bill found that he was really glad his 
father had sent him east, to Tresham. 

Then came a holiday, which is known at Tres- 
ham as Mountain Day, when the Kappa Chi 
brethren called a truce with the freshmen they were 
preparing to initiate and took them on an outing. 
They chartered three huge carryalls, packed away 
a good-sized luncheon, and set out for a day in the 
country — most of them. 

Hawkins and Durham did not go. They had 
football practice, and they planned to leave late in 
the afternoon and join the rest in time for supper. 
Colchester did not go because he wanted to sleep late 
that morning, — nor Burnet, because his father was 
going to pass through town that morning and it 
was necessary that he see him. 

And Bill did not go, because a certain essay in 
history that he had vowed to get off his hands was 
103 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

still unfinished, and he heroically made up his mind 
that he would not make merry a single minute till 
it was done. This was not a particular sacrifice 
under the present circumstances, because he could 
easily get it out of the way by working in the morn- 
ing, and it was planned that he, Colchester, and 
Burnet should get a smaller rig early in the after- 
noon and join the crowd just outside the little old 
town of Greenmeadow. That would be quite as 
much fun as going with the early starters, and would 
get them there in time for the best of the doings. 

Just after lunch they started, with Hawkins 
and Durham waving an elaborate farewell to them 
from the porch. 

“ You’d better keep watch of the guide-posts and 
ask your way every little while,” advised Hawkins 
as Colchester picked up the reins to drive off. “ Ef- 
fie has the record for getting lost around here, and 
if you don’t look out he’ll land you in some God- 
forsaken place that nobody ever heard of.” 

“ By-by, children,” said Colchester serenely. 
“ We’ll be waiting for you at dinner time if you 
don’t miss the train. I’ve been this way at least 
three times,” he added, to allay any doubts his com- 
panions may have had. “ That joke of theirs is a 
chestnut.” 

They had no doubts, however, /knd felt quite 
confident that Effie would get them there without 
104 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


any trouble at all. It was a perfect day, and they 
did not much care whether they got anywhere or 
not so long as they kept on going. This country 
was all new to Bill, and this particular part of it 
to Burnet, and they were full of content just to amble 
leisurely along, talking when they felt like it, now 
and then breaking into song, and sometimes simply 
driving on in silence. Bill had the virtuous feeling 
of one who has done his duty, and Burnet, on top 
of a successful plea to his father regarding a mat- 
ter of great importance — his monthly allowance — 
was enjoying to the full the novel experience of not 
being treated like the scum of the earth by upper- 
classmen. Burnet was not particularly strong for 
Kappa Chi’s ante-initlatlon discipline. 

“ I guess weM better take this road to the left,” 
said Colchester after a time, bringing the horse to 
a stop at a cross-roads. “ We’ll get a dandy view 
of the river this way.” So they took the road to 
the left. 

The view was well worth while, and they rolled 
along for another two hours before Colchester began 
to show signs of uneasiness. He had been feeling 
uneasy for some time before he showed the signs of 
It, but finally he had to come to a halt and admit that 
he didn’t know exactly where he was. 

“ I’ve been here before — I know that,” he said, 
searching the landscape for something that would 
105 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


guide him. “ But I don’t believe it’s the way to 
Greenmeadow.” 

“ There’s a man over in that orchard,” said Bur- 
net. “ We might ask him.” 

“ Excellent idea,” cried Colchester, and he was 
about to suggest that Burnet do the asking, but the 
freshman forestalled him by jumping out of the 
carriage and hurrying across the field. 

The man in the orchard informed them that 
they were headed some miles to the east of Green- 
meadow and were so far out of their way that they 
could not hope to get there before dark. Yorkville 
was the next town on the road they were traveling, 
but by turning to the left about a mile up they 
could eventually strike the right direction again. 

Before they reached the turn, however, a gaudy 
billposter, stuck to the side of an old barn, inspired 
Colchester with a new idea. 

“Doesn’t that appeal to you?” he cried, stop- 
ping the horse for a more careful inspection. “ For 
four years I’ve been wanting to go to a Yorkville 
Cattle Show, and I’ve never thought of it in time. 
We can’t get to Greenmeadow for supper anyway, 
and we might see the fag end of this. What do 
you say? ” 

They said they didn’t mind — in fact, the idea 
rather appealed to them — and instead of turning to 
the left a mile up, they .kept straight ahead and ar- 
jo6 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


rived at the Yorkville fair grounds with an hour of 
the afternoon still before them. 

They hitched the horse under a shed and set 
about making a tour of the sights. Colchester had 
been to country fairs in the days of his boyhood, 
but the others had not, and they found plenty to 
amuse them. The pig and cow and poultry ex- 
hibits received careful attention first, as was fitting, 
and then they started the rounds of the other shows. 

“ Will you look who’s here ! ” exclaimed Bill, 
stopping at the edge of a crowd that surrounded a 
tentlike structure in which some entertainment was 
evidently about to begin. A few feet away from 
them stood Bobby Crane, eating peanuts with gusto 
and grinning amiably upon them. 

“ Greetings I ” he called, beckoning with his bag 
of peanuts. 

“What are you doing here, Bobby?” asked 
Colchester, offering a bag of popcorn in exchange. 

“ Scattering peanut shells and seeing the sights. 
IVe been trying to visit one of these things ever 
since I heard Charley Dalton tell about the one he 
came to once, and I was bound I’d come over this 
fall if I had to come alone. I had to — I couldn’t 
find a soul that showed a spark of interest — so I 
took my touring car and came along.” 

“ Where’s the touring car? ” 

“ Back in the chicken exhibit. Oh, you ought to 
107 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


have seen me arrive! I think nobody ever saw a 
motorcycle around here before. I was one of the 
exhibits myself! I had to lock the thing up to get 
a little decent privacy.” 

“What goes on here? ” asked Bill, seeing that 
the people were beginning to flock into the tent. 

“ Monsieur Louis Mullana, the eminent French 
hypnotist, the eighth wonder of the world! ” Crane 
indicated a flaring placard with a toss of a peanut 
shell. “ Only one dime — ten cents, and I’m going 
to blow myself.” 

They all decided to blow themselves, and hav- 
ing paid their dimes, were admitted to the tent. It 
was not a large tent, and they had hardly entered 
when the doorkeeper announced that those still 
waiting would have to wait on till the next perform- 
ance. After making fast the flap that served as 
a door he disappeared, and a couple of minutes 
later mounted the small stage at the other end of 
the tent in the guise of Monsieur Mullana. 

“ What’ll you bet his name didn’t use to be Ma- 
loney? ” whispered Crane, as the eighth wonder of 
the world advanced to the front of the stage and 
began to explain the nature of the marvels he was 
about to perform with an accent that certainly never 
came out of sunny France. 

“ Now would some kind members of the audi- 
ence kindly step to the platform and lend me their 
io8 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


valuable assistance In doing the little experiments I 
intend to try?” he asked, rubbing his hands to- 
gether and beaming perspiringly upon the tightly 
packed gathering. “ I have a regular assistant, but 
you might say that he was in league with me, so I 
would like some member of the audience who you 
all know to kindly step to the stage, so you can see 
that everything I claim is bony fide.” 

Kind members of the audience were slow to re- 
spond to this invitation, being naturally timid in the 
face of such marvels as Monsieur had guaranteed 
to perform. 

“ Here’s a chance for a little psychological in- 
vestigation,” suggested Crane, leading the way, and 
as one man the four climbed upon the platform. 
That broke the spell, and six or eight others al- 
lowed their curiosity to dispel their timidity and 
came forward also. The audience, moved by this 
daring of their fellow-townsmen, crowded closer. 

The volunteers were arranged in a circle on the 
platform, with Monsieur’s assistant in the center. 
When the arrangement was satisfactory Monsieur 
took his stand in front of them, his back to the 
audience. He stoocfv, impressively silent for a mo- 
ment with his hand over his eyes. 

“ He’s summoning the spirits,” whispered Crane 
audibly, and the circle wavered uneasily. 

Suddenly Monsieur lifted one arm in an impera- 
109 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


tive gesture. Every eye was glued upon him. Then 
with an unintelligible cry he gave his arm a violent 
wave and stamped his foot. 

“You cannot move!” he announced. “Try! 
You cannot move ! ” 

For an instant the circle was motionless. Then, 
defiantly, different members of it lifted a foot or 
wriggled an arm, and the audience stirred with a 
sound that was part sighs of relief and part laugh- 
ter. It would take more than this Frenchman to 
come any mysteries over them! Then their relief 
and amusement merged into astonishment, for two 
of the circle had not moved. The assistant and 
Bobby Crane stood rigid, their distended eyes upon 
Monsieur. 

“What’s the matter, Bobby?” exclaimed Bill, 
nudging Crane, who stood beside him. “ Brace up 1 
You can move if you want to ! ” 

For the tiniest fraction of a second the eyelid 
next to Bill flickered and Bill was answered. 

Monsieur repeated his gyrations once more, and 
this time Bill did not move. Then the eminent 
French hypnotist tackled each one in turn, but not 
another man responded to his power. 

“ We have three very good subjects here,” he 
announced then. “ The others are not in the right 
state of mind, and it would take a great deal of time 
and will power to get them into it, and I can’t afford 


no 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


it. I can work with three just as well as if there was 
ten,” and he dismissed the others with profuse 
thanks. 

Colchester and Burnet jumped down from the 
platform rather mystified. They could not believe 
that Monsieur Mullana had really been able to keep 
anyone from moving, but there stood Crane and 
Bill, rigid and apparently deaf to all their question- 
ing. 

“ I think it’s all a game of theirs,” said Col- 
chester. “ But we’ll stay up front here where we 
can butt in if anything happens.” 

Monsieur’s first experiments were very simple, 
consisting solely in telling his three subjects they 
could not open their mouths, or lift their hands, 
or turn their heads. In each case the three 
tried desperately to do the forbidden thing, and in 
vain. 

Monsieur turned elatedly to the audience. 

“ You can see my power,” he said. “ These two 
gentlemen are strangers to me — I have never set 
eyes on either one of them before — but they will 
obey everything I tell them.” He turned back again 
till he faced Bill, and raised his arm with the strange 
cry that was one of the most prominent manifesta- 
tions of his “ power.” Then with a slow motion of 
both hands before Bill’s face he said slowly: “ You 
are far away from here — you are in a beautiful gar- 


III 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


den full of lovely flowers and fountains and singing 
birds. Beautiful nymp’s ” 

A vacant, idiotic smile had been spreading over 
Bill’s face, and his eye roamed languishingly over the 
heads of the audience. Suddenly Crane stepped for- 
ward and began slowly gyrating about the platform. 

“ I’m a nymp ! I’m a nymp ! ” he warbled joy- 
fully, waving a coquettish hand at Bill. 

Monsieur’s flow of description stopped for an in- 
stant, and a careful observer might have imagined 
that he was surprised at this evidence of his 
“ power.” The assistant entirely forgot the beauti- 
ful garden and the singing birds, and stared as only a 
man in his complete senses can stare. 

“ Oh, nympie, nympie ! ” called Bill, waving 
his hand in turn and plainly meditating pursuit of the 
dancing sprite. 

Up went Monsieur’s arm, fairly hurling 
“ power ” at them. 

“You are in a forest I ” he announced sternly. 
“ A dark, wild forest, full of savage beasts ” 

The assistant got under the influence again with 
a wild howl, and scampered frantically into a corner. 
Crane was evidently no longer a nymph; he began 
pacing rapidly up and down the stage, uttering fero- 
cious growls and snapping viciously at the terrified 
assistant. Bill forsook his pursuit to perch on the 
edge of the platform, chattering and grimacing, and 
1 12 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 

scratching in a frenzied fashion at his head and 
sides. 

A shrill wail showed that the terror of this forest 
primeval had spread to the audience, and a fat farm- 
er-lady had to stop watching the performance long 
enough to soothe her frightened babe. Most of the 
on-lookers wavered between laughter and mystifica- 
tion, for Monsieur’s awesome bearing still lent a 
touch of dignity to the proceedings that even these 
wild animal antics could not utterly destroy. But 
Colchester and Burnet rocked with glee, and tossed 
peanuts at Bill. 

“ Now a hunter approaches ! ” cried Monsieur, 
raising his voice above the growling and the chat- 
tering. “He raises his gun — he fires! You see, 
ladies and gentlemen, the animals are dead.” 

Dead they were, to all appearances. Bill and 
Crane lay stretched out on the platform without a 
quiver or a moan, and the assistant took heart and 
came out of his corner again. 

“ Now,” and Monsieur smiled genially, “ I will 
bring them back, and they won’t remember a thing 
that has happened to them.” 

He went to Bill first, and bending over slightly 
made some gentle passes above his head. 

“ You are coming back,” he murmured monoto- 
nously. “You are coming back, but you will not 
remember the garden and the forest — you are 

113 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

almost back — you are waking up — you are 

awake ! ” 

He finished with a quick snapping of his fingers 
and slapped his hands smartly together. But Bill 
still lay motionless. 

“ You are waking up — you are almost awake! ” 
Monsieur repeated, and went through the snapping 
and slapping again. Bill did not stir. 

“He is tired — he will come out of it in a minute,” 
explained Monsieur easily, and went over to Crane. 
But Crane failed likewise to respond to his exhorta- 
tions. The assistant, who was evidently so used to 
waking up at this juncture that he did not need to be 
told, came forward with something very like a wor- 
ried look. 

“ Did yer really do it to ’em ? ” he whispered, 
poking Bill with his foot. 

“ S-sh 1 ” hissed Monsieur, but the whisper had 
reached some of the audience and created a ripple of 
excitement. What had been merely mystifying and 
amusing bade fair to develop into something more 
serious, and even those who had not heard crowded 
nearer. 

“ Do you think anything is really the matter with 
them? ” asked Burnet. 

“ Of course not,” said Colchester decidedly. 
“ They’re putting it on, just like all the rest of it.” 

But the excuse that they were “ tired ” failed to 
114 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


satisfy Monsieur’s audience, and keeping them from 
storming the platform gave him all he could at- 
tend to, while at the same time he was muttering 
commands, entreaties, and swear words at his two 
prostrate “ subjects.” At length they could be re- 
strained no longer, and the assistant made a hasty 
and worried exit. 

“Something may be the matter!” exclaimed 
Burnet. “ Perhaps he was really making them do. 
those things I ” 

“ Don’t you believe it! But we might as well 
take a hand in the reviving,” and Colchester climbed 
to the platform and elbowed his way into the circle 
that now surrounded the plainly uneasy Monsieur. 

The afternoon was waning, and inside the tent 
the light had given way to a dusky twilight in which 
all sorts of gruesome things seemed possible. A 
silence had fallen, strangely emphasized by the cry- 
ing of the farmer-lady’s baby, as Colchester stooped 
over Bill’s outstretched figure. He certainly did 
look unusually pale. 

“Bill!” Colchester cried sharply. “Look 
here, and cut out the fooling! ” He seized Bill by 
the shoulder and shook him roughly. 

“ Better get some water,” someone suggested, 
and Monsieur added fuel to the excitement by try- 
ing to steal away while Colchester held the center 
of attention. But the very mention of water seemed 

115 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


to have a restorative effect, for Bill began to moan 
uneasily and after a minute opened his eyes. 

“What’s the matter?” he murmured, and at 
the same time Crane also began to show signs of 
returning consciousness. 

“Ye can see they’re all right! ” protested Mon- 
sieur, so hard pressed that he had clean forgot he 
was a French Monsieur. But his audience had 
been stirred to too deep an indignation at his un- 
holy practices to be calmed by any such protest as 
that. They were for haling him forth to justice. 

“ There’s a row coming, and we’d better beat 
it,” whispered Crane, getting to his feet and edging 
away. “ The embattled farmers are going to get 
after Mr. Maloney good and plenty.” 

“Come out into the air!” said Colchester 
loudly, taking Bill and Crane each by an arm and 
leading them out. There was a movement to fol- 
low them, for the testimony of these resurrected 
ones would be worth listening to, but Monsieur 
Mullana was showing signs of fight, and that was 
worth much more. So Colchester and his charges 
came out alone, with Burnet close at tKeir heels. 

Three or four who had not been able to get ad- 
mittance stood outside. 

“ Show over? ” one of them asked. 

“ Oh, no — it’s just beginning,” answered Bill. 
“ Say,” he added, as Colchester started hurrying 
1 16 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 


them away. “ Do you think the old fakir is going 
to get into any trouble? ” 

“ He may get his head punched — that’s all,” 
said Crane serenely. 

“ But that isn’t fair! We ought to tell them we 
were only faking.” 

“ Ridgeway,” said Crane solemnly, “ those peo- 
ple paid their good dimes to go in there and get- 
fooled — but they didn’t want to know it. If Mon- 
sieur Maloney can get away with it and make them 
think they’ve seen something marvelous, they’ll 
feel that they’ve had their money’s worth and be 
properly grateful. It’ll give ’em something to talk 
about for a good long time. But if you get fool- 
ish and tell ’em it’s all a fake, they’ll turn and rend 
you — take my word for it. Personally, I’m going 
over to the chicken shed and get my touring car, and 
then I’m going home.” 

“ Don’t run away and desert us like that. Isn’t 
there a hotel or something around here where we can 
get a square meal?” asked Colchester. 

“ There’s a hotel in Yorkville — I don’t know 
about the square meal.” 

“ You’d better stay and try it, Bobby.” 

Bobby consented to stay, and they found the 
meal as square as they had any desire for. Col- 
chester called up the Greenmeadow Inn, where the 
rest of the Kappa Chi brethren were holding forth, 
9 117 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

and, lest they should be worrying about him, told 
them he had suddenly changed his mind and come 
to the Yorkville Cattle Show. 

“ If you have any regard for my feelings at all,” 
he pleaded when he came back to the table, “ for 
Heaven’s sake swear that that’s the truth. That 
man Hawkins will howl about it for a week if he 
knows I lost my way.” 

Burnet, especially, enjoyed that meal, as he had 
enjoyed the whole afternoon. It had been weeks, 
now, it seemed, since any of the Kappa Chi men had 
treated him like a fellow being, and to-day, with Bill 
and Colchester calling him “ Bunny ” and appar- 
ently forgetting that he was a measly freshman, was 
a day to be remembered. He wished very much 
that there were no such things as seniors and sopho- 
mores and freshmen. People get on such a lot 
better when they forget it. 

The evening was well along when Crane gave 
them parting explicit instructions about the way 
home and mounted his motorcycle to speed ahead. 

“ I’m sorry, but I can’t mope along at your 
gait,” he said. “ My old steed here would run 
down.” 

With the big autumn moon to light them they had 
a long and beautiful ride back. Burnet lingered while 
the horse was put in the stable, and his good night at 
the corner was almost wistful. 

Ii8 


A RURAL ADVENTURE 

“Poor Bunny!’’ said Bill, when he had left 
them and turned toward the Dorms. “ To-morrow 
he’s got to call us Mister again, and take off his hat 
to us.” 

“ It won’t be much longer,” answered Colches- 
ter. “ And it’s supposed to be good for him. Com- 
ing down to the house ? ” 


CHAPTER VI 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 

S UFFERING kittens, Bunny! You don’t call 
this an English theme, do you?” 

It being a vacant hour between recitations. 
Bill had dropped into Burnet’s room to save himself 
the five minutes’ walk down to Mrs. Sleeper’s and 
back. This had become more or less of a habit with 
him since initiation was over and he was able to 
associate with the freshmen on terms approaching 
equality, and he was poking about on the table for 
something to read, though he usually ended by spend- 
ing the hour in talking. A bulky manuscript, written 
in a scrawly hand and folded, was the only thing new 
he came upon, and struck by its size, he picked it up 
curiously. 

“ Sure I ” answered Burnet. “ Better read it. 
There’s a lot of things in it I bet you never knew 
before.” 

“ I should hope so I If I knew enough to fill 
this I’d quit going to college. How did you ever 
have the nerve to hand it in? If I were a professor 
I’d flunk a man that handed me a thing this size.” 


120 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


No you wouldn’t, after you’d read it. I got 
an A on that theme.” 

Conundrum : Why is Bunny Burnet like a 
shrinking violet? Answer: He isn’t, because a 
shrinking violet doesn’t write English themes and is 
noted for its modesty.” Bill fixed himself by the 
window and unfolded the manuscript. “ I’ve only 
got an hour, but I’ll tackle the first instalment. 
‘ Sabrina,’ eh? How do you come to know so much 
about Sabrina? ” 

“ Oh, my family used to live in Tresham years 
ago, when Sabrina used to be here, and my uncle 
was in college when they started the banquet stunt. 
I’ve got a brother who was a Sabrina man, too.” 

“ Quite a Sabrina family. Why didn’t you 
wait a year, so you could be in the right class your- 
self?” 

“ Couldn’t. I think I’ll go through in three 
years, though. That’ll land me in an even-year class 
and do just as well — unless we should happen to get 
her away from you.” 

“Hu-uh! A fat chance you stand of getting 
her away, from all I’ve heard on the subject! I 
guess you’d better try plugging real hard and skip 
into our class. There are worse classes to be in, you 
know. Say, Bunny, I wish you’d had this typewrit- 
ten. You’re one of the real genii, if bum writing is 
any sign.” 


I2I 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Burnet made no reply and Bill started reading. 

He had heard of Sabrina almost the first day after 
he arived in Tresham, but she was still hardly more 
than a name to him, and he knew next to nothing of 
her history. To tell the truth, that history, as most 
people know it now, is such a mixture of fact and 
fiction, mingled haphazard as it has come down 
through the years, that no undergraduate of to-day 
can tell what is to be vouched for and what not. 
But everyone accepts the story as tradition has 
shaped it, and it was thus that Burnet had put it 
down in his theme. 

Burnet sat down at his desk with a book before 
him, but with the conscious air of an author whose 
work is under inspection he kept stealing glances at 
Bill’s face, seeking for some expression of approval 
or enjoyment there. But Bill’s face wore nothing 
but a scowl. 

“ Say, Bunny,” he exclaimed at length. 
“ What’s this word?” 

Burnet went over and looked. 

“ ‘ Legends,’ of course,” he said. 

“No ‘of course* about it! It looks like 
‘ liquids ’ to me. You never dot your i*5 anyway. 
How is anyone to know those are e^sf ” 

He struggled on, with Burnet standing by to de- 
cipher whenever he could not make out a word. 

“ Honestly, I can’t read it! ” he cried at length. 


122 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


“ It’s — it’s worse than a Greek lesson. Read it to 
me, won’t you? I’d really like to find out some- 
thing about the old lady, and you ought to have a 
fact or two tucked away somewhere in all this 
mass.” 

Burnet took the manuscript, colored, and 
coughed. He disliked reading his own production 
aloud — it sounded like showing off — but he had lit- 
erary aspirations, and he really wanted Bill’s opin- 
ion of it. 

“ Shall I start at the beginning? ” he asked. 

“ I wish you would. To tell the truth, I didn’t 
exactly get the drift of it all.” 

All right. Only if you fall asleep. I’ll throw 
something at you,” he said, and began reading. 

‘‘ ‘ Sabrina has been an institution at Tresham 
College for so long that she has finally become a 
full-fledged tradition, about whom legends have 
been busy now for many a year. Long ago, when 
the college was only a little cluster of some half 
dozen buildings or so on the hill, she occupied a re- 
spectable decorative position on the campus, and all 
who would might come and look upon her. But 
students in those days saw only the bronze statue of 
a maiden, sitting peaceably in the middle of an or- 
dinary flower bed. Those who had studied their 
college English to good purpose — if boys studied 
college English in that far-off time — could recog- 
123 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


nize In her, if they thought about it, a certain kindly 
water fairy, who came to the rescue of a distressed 
lady in a famous poem by John Milton.’ ” 

Burnet turned the page and looked up inquir- 
ingly. 

Bill nodded. 

“ Very fine ! ” he observed. “ Sounds just like 
a real author.” 

Burnet continued reading. 

“ ‘ But I am afraid they did not consider her 
with the respect so classical a person deserved. At 
any rate, they did not treat her respectfully, for one 
morning when everyone was hurrying to get into his 
seat before the chapel bell stopped ringing, the 
bronze goddess sat revealed to them in the midst of 
her little garden, decked in a hideous coat of fresh 
paint. It was green paint, if I remember rightly. 
From that day the poor lady was the object of all 
manner of indignities. On winter mornings the 
chapel-goers came to find it no uncommon thing to 
behold her draped fantastically in a bright-hued 
crazy quilt, or clad in the cast-off garments of some 
freshman, bent on a practical joke. From time to 
time she received a new coat of paint, until her origi- 
nal color was a thing to be guessed at, perhaps, but 
never known for certain. At length those in au- 
thority decided that she was no longer a dignified 
and beautiful ornament for the campus, though 
124 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


originally, I have heard, she was very beautiful. 
There is a small reproduction of her in the library 
now.’ ” 

‘‘ Where?” asked Bill. 

“ Upstairs in a sort of show-case. I shouldn’t 
have put that in, according to Mr. Professor’s red- 
ink marks. It spoils the continuity.” 

“ Interesting fact, though. I’ll have a look at 
her.” 

“ ‘ She was cast away,’ ” Burnet continued, “ ‘ to 
be sold for old junk, and passed into the oblivion of 
the janitor’s junk heap, where she lay, no one knows 
how long, forgotten. Since then, the public at large 
has seen her no more. 

“ ‘ Since then, too, the public at large has had to 
depend wholly upon hearsay for news of her, and 
here legend has stepped in and taken a hand in her 
history. Many things are told of her that may never 
have happened at all, but what we can be sure of is 
this — that one year one of the students who had al- 
ways lived in Tresham and remembered Sabrina as 
a boy ’ ” 

“ It wasn’t your respected uncle, was it? ” 

“No; my uncle didn’t live in Tresham. But it 
was one of his classmates. I used to get Uncle 
Henry to tell me about it when I was a kid. He was 
one of the fellows ” 

“ Let’s hear your tale in its proper order. 
125 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


You’re no kind of an author to be interrupting your 
story to skip ahead that way.” 

Very well, — ‘conceived the idea of hunting her 
up, if she still existed. He found that she did still 
exist, and that the janitor, who for some reason had 
not been willing to destroy her, had put her away 
somewhere. After searching around, he at length 
discovered her in the janitor’s barn. That discov- 
ery marked the beginning of her second series of 
adventures, which have continued to this day. She 
was kidnapped and taken away to a class banquet. 
It evidently proved to be a successful stunt, for the 
class kept her as its presiding goddess all the rest of 
the time they were in college, and when they came 
to be seniors, being an even-year class, they planned 
to turn her over to the next even-year class, then 
sophomores, as a most sacred legacy. It was to be 
a grand affair, observed with fitting ceremonies and 
ending in a celebration that everyone who took part 
in it would remember as one of the times of his life. 
But their plans did not turn out happily. Those who 
had charge of the matter attempted to carry the god- 
dess through the town, in broad daylight, in an open 
wagon. The result was disastrous. A crowd of 
odd-year men saw them, and almost before the 
guardians of the statue realized what was happen- 
ing, they had lost her. 

“ ‘ Then the odd-year men made her their divin- 
126 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


ity, and they in turn planned to bequeath her to their 
successors. They accomplished their plan more suc- 
cessfully, and Sabrina might be the goddess of the 
odd classes to this day if an even-year man had not 
discovered that she was to be shipped somewhere 
by express, and fooled an assistant expressman into 
handing her over to him. He got away with her, 
but his class spirit got him into a lot of trouble. The 
law was invoked, ^d the story is that he had to 
take a little trip out of the country until the storm 
blew over. 

“ ‘ From that time, every two years, Sabrina has 
been handed down from class to class, so that for 
years even-year classes have been known as “Sabrina 
men,” held together by a bond which enemies may 
scoff at but never deny. They have a song to her 
which is their war chant: 

‘'All hail, Sabrina dear. 

The widow of each passing year; 

Long may she ever be 
The widow of posterity,” 

and their singing of it is always a cry to battle that 
stirs up a furore fit to raise the roof, for no odd- 
class man can hear it without shouting his loudest to 
drown it out. 

“ ‘ The goddess is never seen even by her wor- 
shipers except at a banquet, which is held every other 
127 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


year and is a great secret. No odd-class man has 
beheld her at all since the days of the early Nine- 
ties, though they still vainly struggle to regain pos- 
session of her. That is why freshmen and juniors 
stick more closely by one another at Tresham than 
they do at other colleges — if they belong to an even- 
year class, because they are Sabrina men, if not, be- 
cause they hate Sabrina. 

“ ‘ They tell all sorts of tales about the places 
her guardians have hidden her in. In the good old 
days that older men always love to boast of, she had 
very wonderful adventures, buried in caves, hidden 
in barns, sunk in harbors. She spent a year in a 
negro crap joint down among the city wharves; she 
took a trip to Europe. They even say that once she 
stayed for a time at the bottom of the college well. 
But now — again according to hearsay — they follow 
a more modern fashion and keep her securely in a 
safe-deposit vault. When the sophomore class is 
entrusted with her she is put into the hands of one 
man. He alone knows where she is concealed, and 
no one else even knows who this guardian is except 
the president of the class, who appoints him. 

“ ‘ That is all we know of Sabrina now, and all 
of this we cannot be sure of. Perhaps a good deal 
of it is mere glamour gilded by the artistic hand of 
fancy. She makes a good story anyway, and we who 
can never behold her may console ourselves with the 
128 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


thought that, after all, she is now more of a tradi- 
tion than anything else. The old, keen rivalry that 
once made such strong class spirit has departed. 
The old sporting element has dropped out, for in 
these prosaic days the love of adventure is dead. 
There is no chance any more for us to get at her. 
We cannot break open safe-deposit vaults, nor can 
we go down to New York and storm a hotel that 
is guarded by policemen. For nowadays it is al- 
ways there, and thus, that Sabrina men hold their 
banquets. She cannot mean so much to them now 
as she did in the olden days, when to keep her 
meant to fight for her. And so what was once one 
of the finest incentives to class spirit in college 
has degenerated into a biennial excuse for a good 
time.’ ” 

Burnet had forgotten that he was merely read- 
ing a theme he had written for his course in English. 
He lost himself in the spirit of what he was saying, 
and with raised voice and flushed cheeks, he finished 
in a grand elocutionary flourish. Then Bill, with 
serious face but twinkling eyes, applauding wildly 
in dumb show, brought him to earth. 

“Well?” he questioned, rather embarrassed at 
his own enthusiasm. 

“ We-11,” Bill spoke judicially, as if rendering 
a weighty opinion, “ I think that ending’s a little 
strong for a man who is planning to skip a class so 
129 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


he can go and do likewise. Isn’t there just a little 
bit of green apples, or sour apples, or whatever you 
call it, in that grand finale? ” 

“No, sir!” declared Burnet emphatically. 
“ You wait till you’ve been here a while longer and 
see if you don’t think the same thing. You’ll never 
admit it, of course, because you’re a Sabrina man, 
but I know just the way you’ll feel about it.” 

“ Hum! You know. Bunny, I’ve been in this in- 
stitution just exactly as long as you have — ^but per- 
haps you’ve had better chances of sizing this thing 
up. I can’t say I’ve got into the Sabrina spirit very 
hard yet, that’s true.” 

“ But just look ! Don’t you think all those things 
must have been fun? And wasn’t there something 
sort of splendid about it besides — that idea of hav- 
ing something that held the classes together, and 
that they could fight for, and all that ? I can feel it 
myself, just for a minute, when they sing that ‘ All 
hail, Sabrina,’ before people get to yelling and make 
a farce out of it.” 

“ But the yelling ought to be just what you like 
— fighting and rivalry and that sort of thing. 
That’s the kind of spirit you’re howling for, isn’t 
it?” 

“ Oh, Billy! You know it isn’t! The yelling is 
as far as they ever get now, and that’s just a matter 
of form. There isn’t anything back of it. How 
130 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


can there be when everybody knows they won’t ever 
get a chance to do anything hut yell? You don’t 
know how it used to be when Sabrina was real. 
There was always a chance that something might 
really happen then.” 

“Well! Where’s your tobacco, Bunny? Thanks. 
You know, all these things you hear about that used 
to happen make pretty good stories, but I have an 
idea there’s about as much doing now. Perhaps not 
in the Sabrina line — the old lady may have petered 
out. But there are plenty of other things. Maybe 
when it gets to be our turn we can stir up a little en- 
thusiasm about her again. I guess the fellows would 
scrap over her now as hard as they ever did if they 
had a chance.” 

“ That’s the trouble : there aren’t any more 
chances. You Sabrina men are scared to death of 
taking a chance. You want it to be such a sure 
thing that you’d have your old banquet out in San 
Francisco before you’d risk our being within reach- 
ing distance of you.” 

“ It’s too bad. Bunny! I tell you, if I ever get 
to be the sacred, lady’s custodian, I promise you I’ll 
hide her right here in Tresham. That’s about as 
near as I can get. And after she’s handed on to 
somebody else I’ll tell you all about it.” 

“ I guess that’s a safe promise, all right. Butt 
Chanler will have to appoint the man from your 

131 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


class, and you won’t catch him appointing one of his 
own delegation.” 

“ Perhaps not, but that might be the very rea- 
son he’d do it. You can’t tell. Anyway, you’d bet- 
ter keep your eye on William.” 

Burnet laughed and folded his manuscript. 
“Talk about shrinking violets!” he exclaimed. 
“ But say, who do you suppose has her now? ” 

“ Couldn’t tell, really. Meredith knows, I pre- 
sume, according to that document of yours. Has 
he always been class president? ” 

“ I don’t know — but ” Burnet still held his 

manuscript in his hand, tapping it and hesitating. 
“ Say, honestly,” he said abruptly, “ what do you 
think of this stuff? Do you think I can write? ” 

“ Lord, don’t ask me ! I thought it was good 
enough. I was interested anyway, and I know I 
couldn’t do anywhere near as well myself. You’ve 
got sort of a literary bug, haven’t you. Bunny?” 

“ Um — sort of, maybe.” Seeing that he could 
not get a real criticism, Burnet was ready to drop 
the subject. His “ literary bug ” was not a thing 
he liked to talk about in cold blood. “ The bell is 
going to ring in about two minutes and Pve got to 
get down to the Lab. Coming? ” 

Bill’s next recitation happened to be a lecture 
that wasn’t particularly engrossing, and he found 
132 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


after a few minutes that, instead of listening to the 
professor, he was reviewing in his mind the scraps 
of Sabrina lore Burnet had just been reading to him. 
Most of it he had never heard before, and it had a 
story-book kind of attraction for him that set his 
fancy working. It smacked of secrecy and adven- 
ture, and though he had listened carelessly enough 
to Burnet’s enthusiasm, the spirit of it was conta- 
gious, and his thoughts were busy all during the 
hour weaving new tales about the much-traveled 
goddess, in which he himself bore part. 

When the lecture was over he made straight for 
the house and for Butt’s room, bent on getting fur- 
ther information. He found Butt practicing on his 
mandolin — he seemed to be forever doing that 
nowadays — and Durham reading in a corner as 
serenely as if there were no such thing as an am- 
bitious amateur musician within miles. 

“ Butt ! ” Bill waited for a lull in the practic- 
ing, but none seemed imminent, and he interrupted. 
Butt did not stop, but continued to play, only notic- 
ing Bill’s peremptory greeting with an absent 
“Uh-huh?” 

“ Listen, won’t you? I’m looking for informa- 
tion.” 

Butt stopped, his pick poised above the strings. 

“ Fire ahead — I’m a regular fountain of it.” 

“ I want to know some more about Sabrina.” 

133 


10 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


‘‘ She’s the guardian angel of the best class in 
Tresham College, and if you’re a good boy you’ll be 
allowed to look upon her some time before the year’s 
over.” 

“ Oh, I knew that before ! Haven’t you any in- 
side information? ” 

“ Um — little boys shouldn’t ask questions — 
about Sabrina.” 

“ Robert Barrington Chanler, if you call me a 
little boy again I’ll turn you over my knee.” 

“ He is obstreperous for a small-sized person, 
isn’t he?” observed Durham, looking up from his 
book. 

“ Does he really know a lot of things nobody 
else knows, or is he just bluffing? ” 

“ Oh, that’s a habit of his, and it’s growing on 
him. Just say ‘ Sabrina ’ to little Robert and he puffs 
out with all kinds of things he could tell if he only 
would.” 

“ Butt! Does that mean the banquet is coming 
off pretty soon? ” cried Bill. 

“ When the proper time comes for you to know, 
you will know whatever is proper for you to know,” 
and Butt began diligently tinkling away at his man- 
dolin again. 

“ Don’t be so easy. Bill,” advised Durham. 
“ He’s stringing you, and it’s just his meat when 
anyone bites like that.” 


134 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


“ Butt, will you shut off that noise for a minute 
and listen? ” Butt shut off the noise, smiling. “ If 
you go to treating me like a rank outsider. I’ll get 
busy and ferret out the whole business. You know 
I’m an awful ferreter.” 

Butt continued to smile indulgently. 

“ Sure you are. But I guess you don’t know 
Sabrina. She’s a magic lady, and she doesn’t ferret 
worth a cent. Call in Mr. Sherlock Holmes and all 
the rest of your sleuthhounds, and I’ll bet on Sa- 
brina every time. They’ve been trying to track her 
for years, you know.” 

“Oh, yes. They have I But I haven’t begun 
yet.” 

“ Gee, Bill, you don’t care what you say about 
yourself, do you? But you want to remember that 
Sabrina isn’t Herbie Nichols.” 

“ Humph! ” Bill gave vent to something that 
was both a snort and a laugh. “ You must be get- 
ting friendly with the funny man. How long since 
he’s been ‘ Herbie ’ ? ” 

“ Oh, Herbie isn’t so bad after you get to know 
him. Just a little crude, and if you’re terribly fussy 
you might say that he lacks some of the instincts of 
a gentleman. But he means as well as anyone can.” 

“ I should call that knocking some, if you asked 
me.” 

“ No, it isn’t. I’m not knocking him. I’m just 

135 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


telling the truth. I’ve been seeing more or less of 
him lately, and he isn’t such a bad sort, honestly. 
He’s pretty well ashamed of that stunt of his, haz- 
ing time. It was an asinine thing to do, I know, but 
it isn’t right to judge him just by that. You or I 
might have done the very same thing if we’d been 
like him.” 

“ But we don’t happen to be like him, and that 
isn’t conceit either.” 

“ I think Butt’s getting scared about his popu- 
larity,” remarked Durham with the suggestion of a 
wink. “ He’s afraid he hasn’t got his class presi- 
dency cinched quite strong enough, so he’s drum- 
ming up touts. I would like to state that personally, 
however, I don’t think much of bootlicking,” and 
Durham ducked down behind his book. 

Butt flushed indignantly. 

“ Bull Dur ” he burst out, and stopped. 

“ Got a rise! ” chuckled Durham. 

“ Well, I think Nichols likes me, and there’s 
no need of being nasty and snobbish to him just be- 
cause I don’t happen to be crazy over him.” 

“ Do you talk Sabrina secrets with him? ” asked 
Bill slyly. 

Butt serenely ignored the question and went at 
his practicing again. Bill picked up a magazine that 
lay on the table, found it was one he had already 
read, and sauntered upstairs to Colchester’s room. 

136 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 


He had found a congenial soul in Colchester, and 
Effie’s room was one of his favorite dropping-in 
places. But to-day the door proved to be locked 
when he started to enter. 

‘‘ Who is it? ” called Colchester from inside. 

“Bill. Never mind! I didn’t want anything 
special.” 

But Colchester opened the door. 

“ Come on in,” he said. 

“ Sure I’m not butting in on anything? ” 

“ Not a thing. I’d tell you if you were.” 

Bill protested no more but entered. He halted 
for the fraction of a second when he saw who else 
was there, a sudden suspicion flashing across his 
mind, born of all the Sabrina talk he had been hear- 
ing that morning. Colchester’s visitor was Mere- 
dith, the senior president, not a great frequenter of 
the Kappa Chi house. Bill eyed him closely, look- 
ing for some sign that his coming had been an em- 
barrassing interruption. He found none at all, but 
the suspicion lingered. Out of sheer curiosity he 
ventured on a remark that might reveal a betraying 
word or look. 

“ I’ve been hunting for information all over 
the house,” he said, “ and I can’t get anybody that 
will tell me a thing. I never saw such a tight 
bunch.” 

“ Then you’ve come to the original information 

137 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

bureau,” Colchester rejoined. “ What’s the sub- 
ject?” 

“ Sabrina.” 

Bill watched them both closely, but not so much 
as the flicker of an eyelid told that he had hit any 
mark. Meredith continued his imperturbable smok- 
ing, and Colchester smiled amiably. 

“ Merry’s the man for you,” he said, flicking the 
ashes off his cigarette. “ He’s supposed to know 
all there is for anybody but the man to know about 
the lady’s present state of health.” 

“ Oh, I wasn’t looking for secrets,” cried Bill 
hastily, with a sudden fear that he had been too 
fresh. “ But the minute I spoke of Sabrina to Butt 
Chanler, he put on a ‘ run away, little one, and don’t 
ask questions ’ air — you know that’s enough to make 
anyone want to nose around.” 

“ Sabrina is quite safe, so far as I know,” Mere- 
dith remarked evenly. “ You know this is the year 
for the banquet. You’ll see her if you take it 
in.” 

Bill had an uneasy feeling that Meredith was 
using seriously the “ don’t ask questions, little one,” 
attitude that Butt had been assuming in fun. Mere- 
dith was not like Colchester. He seemed always 
conscious of being a senior, as if that were a dis- 
tinction which others might overlook, and though 
he was always affable enough toward Bill, it was 

138 


FRESHMAN BURNET WRITES A THEME 

with an air of unbending that came perilously near 
being condescension. 

Well, I’ll try to be a good boy, and deserve the 
honor,” Bill could not resist replying, but so amia- 
bly that only Colchester saw how little he meant 
it. And Colchester immediately changed the sub- 
ject. 

“ They’ve got the Thanksgiving trip all ar- 
ranged,” he observed. “ We start Wednesday.” 

“ What — the Musical Clubs? ” cried Bill. “Am 
I going to be taken along? ” 

“ Maybe — if you’re a good boy. And Butt, too. 
You’re engaged right now for Thanksgiving. We’re 
going out to my town, you know, and I want you and 
Butt and Tommy to ^ut up with me.” 

“Won’t I do that, though? Does Butt know 
yet?” 

“ Not unless he’s seen Tod Smith since two 
o’clock. It wasn’t finally decided till then.” 

“ I’ll have to be going along,” interrupted Mere- 
dith, rising and reaching for his hat. 

“ Oh, I beg your pardon. Merry! ” Colchester 
exclaimed. “ We’ve sort of got glee clubs and 
mandolin clubs on the brain down here just now, 
and I forget other people may be sensible enough 
not to have. Don’t hurry away! ” 

But Meredith really had to go, rather to Bill’s 
relief. 


139 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“Doesn’t he ever loosen up?” he asked when 
Meredith was safely out of the room. 

“ Oh, yes. But he keeps that as a kind of spe- 
cial accomplishment for his friends. He’s done it 
right here in this room, though, once or twice.” 

Bill let fall his jaw in mock amazement. 

“ This very room ? I want to know ! But, Effie, 
don’t tell Butt about the trip for just a little while. 
I know how I can worry him, and I want to pay him 
back for the uppish way he’s acted to me all day.” 

“ All right. But Bill ” as Bill started for 

the door, “ why this sudden thirst for informa- 
tion?” 

Bill paused on the threshold. 

“ Information? ” 

“ Didn’t you say you came up here hunting for 
information? ” 

“ Oh, you mean about Sabrina? ” 

“ Yes.” 

“ Oh, Bunny Burnet had me reading a theme he 
wrote about her this afternoon and it got me inter- 
ested.” 

“Oh!” 

And Bill went down the hall, his mind busier 
than ever. Why had Colchester come back to that 
subject again? 


CHAPTER VII 


OLD SLOUCH ON THE WARPATH 


r EY-AY! Hold the car! 

Three yelling figures sped up the street in 
the wake of the departing trolley car, coats 
flying open, suitcases in one hand, hats in the other. 
Stray students along the street took up the cry, rein- 
forcing it with shrill whistles. At the corner the 
car stopped, and, hearing them, waited till they 
tumbled aboard, hot and panting. It was the Kappa 
Chi wing of the Musical Clubs — except Gray, who 
was always far-sighted enough to be on time — long- 
legged Bill in the lead. Butt next, loaded down with 
a mandolin case in addition to his other baggage, 
and last of all big Colchester, whom Tod Smith 
helped up the steps just as the car started moving 
again. 

“ If you get out of my sight on this trip before 
the last concert’s over, I’ll eat my new hat- 
box! ” exclaimed the anxious leader. “ For once I’m 
going to make sure myself you don’t miss any 
trains.” 

141 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“I never missed one yet, did I?” asked Col- 
chester mildly, wiping his perspiring face. 

“ You’ve given me gray hairs, you’ve come so 
near it so many times. Get along in — there’s a 
freshman holding a seat for us up ahead,” and Tod 
Smith pushed his big charge into the car. “ Gee I 
You had me worried! ” he cried, when they were 
seated. “ You know Phil Sands squealed the last 
minute — or he didn’t squeal, exactly; the doctor 
said there wasn’t any use in his coming, because h-e 
couldn’t sing with that bum throat of his — and you 
know what that second bass part would sound like 
without either of you. Those new men get scared 
silly when there isn’t anyone to lean on.” 

One of those same new men, being the freshman 
who had held the seat for them, flushed uncomfort- 
ably at the remark he could not help overhearing. 
Bill, standing in the aisle just alongside, also over- 
heard the remark and saw the flush, and catching 
the freshman’s eye, he winked. Which comforted 
the freshman. 

‘‘ Where’ve you been all the morning? ” pursued 
Tod Smith. “ Merry has been running his head off 
trying to find you, and I telephoned three times.” 

“ Oh, everywhere 1 I’ve been up to the barber- 
shop for the last hour. I had to get one of the fel- 
lows to pack my things and bring ’em uptown, or 
I’d never have made this car.” 


142 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


‘‘ Effie, you’re the limit! Oh, I forgot! Merry 
gave me something to give you. Wait a minute.” 
Smith began a leisurely search of his pockets, and 
Bill, who still could not help overhearing, turned 
his head enough to watch. He had pondered much 
over possible secret relations between Meredith and 
Colchester, and his scent for clues was aroused and 
alert. “ Here it is,” said Smith. 

“ Thanks.” Colchester took the envelope with 
a splendid display of carelessness, though his eyes 
darted quickly about him as he put it in his inside 
pocket. Everyone was apparently deep in affairs 
of his own, including Bill, who was discussing the 
weather with the freshman. “ Merry knew I was 
hard up,” Colchester remarked, which evidently ex- 
plained the whole matter. 

The weather gave way to other topics of gen- 
eral interest, and Bill’s conversation with the fresh- 
man kept up till they reached Southboro. But Bill 
had one ear open for what went on between the two 
seniors. It was attention wasted, however. They 
talked of the second bass part, and the other parts, 
and at length of the town they were bound for and 
a girl Tod Smith knew there. But not another word 
of Meredith. 

At the Southboro station, while they were wait- 
ing for the train. Bill, ever on the watch, saw Col- 
chester disappear around the corner of the building. 

143 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


He was gone only a very short time, and was back 
again before Bill could follow him. But after mak- 
ing sure that he would not be observed, Bill also 
went around the corner. There on the sidewalk 
were still a few tiny fragments of paper which 
the wind had not yet blown away, and Bill smiled 
as he saw them. The clues were pointing more and 
more certainly. 

He felt like smiling many times that day, out of 
sheer pleasure at himsMf and the way things were 
going. If he had been required to explain just how 
things were going, and what they were going to- 
ward, and how he knew it, anyone would have been 
quite justified in laughing at him. But he felt sat- 
isfied, nevertheless. And Butt had said Sabrina 
didn’t ferret worth a cent 1 

The concert that night was a small and unim- 
portant one, which they all looked on as nothing 
more than a rehearsal for the Thanksgiving concert 
in Stanfield the next evening. Bill kept close watch 
on Colchester all the evening, especially after they 
had gone to the little hotel for the night, but his 
watchfulness discovered nothing. He did not ex- 
pect it to, however. And he smiled again, for 
on the morrow they were going to Stanfield ! 

Stanfield was Colchester’s ,home town, and Bill, 
Butt, and Gray were to be Colchester’s guests. It 
ought to be easy to keep a fairly constant eye on 
144 


“OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 

his host, and if Meredith’s note and Effie’s pains to 
read it in secret and then destroy it had had any- 
thing at all to do with the goddess Sabrina, they 
meant there would be something doing in Stan- 
field. And if there was anything doing. Bill meant 
to know about it. 

He wanted badly to tell Butt of his suspicions 
and let him into the fun of following them up, but 
the terribly serious way Butt looked at everything 
that had to do with Sabrina made him afraid. Butt 
would not see the fun of it, he felt sure — it would 
seem too much like tampering with sacred things — 
and he would be a wet-blanket at best; perhaps he 
would even blurt out the whole business and spoil 
everything. Bill decided that after all he had better 
keep his little detective lark to himself. It was 
safer, and besides, if it turned out to be nothing but 
a wild goose chase. Butt couldn’t laugh at him. 

But it is not altogether an easy matter to keep 
tabs on one’s host in his own house, and the fact that 
Bill was naturally a respecter of the proprieties put 
him at rather a disadvantage when it came to sleuth- 
ing. Colchester and his family exerted themselves 
so heartily to make their guests feel at home 
that it gave him a sudden qualm of conscience. 
This spying business, even in fun, might be all right 
back in college, but to keep it up here in Colchester’s 
home would be acting like anything but a gentle- 

145 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

man. The old bronze statue wasn’t worth It, and 
Bill resolutely put the whole thing out of his mind. 

The Colchesters made the day a Thanksgiving 
of the regular old-fashioned kind. The family was 
large anyway, and, increased by the three fellows 
from Tresham and Effie’s two schoolgirl cousins, 
it made a jolly houseful. Dinner was a long and 
joyous feast, and after it they played kid-games, ti^ 
dusk began to fall and it was time to dress for the 
evening. 

Not till they had started upstairs did Bill notice 
that Colchester had disappeared, and the thoughts 
he had so firmly banished from his mind came pop- 
ping back. They popped back to stay when he got 
upstairs in the room where he and Butt were to 
sleep. He happened to glance out one of the win- 
dows, which looked upon the huge barn that was at 
the back of the house, and he glanced just in time 
to seeXolchester closing the barn door. He locked 
it and came toward the house. In his hand he car- 
ried a hammer. 

The sight of that hammer was to Bill like the 
scent of blood to a bloodhound. It was perfectly 
clear to him now. Sabrina was in that barn, nailed 
up in a box probably, and Colchester had been 
paying her a visit! Why, he did not stop to think, 
but he felt sure she was there. His face flushed 
with excitement, and his eyes gleamed as they stared 
146 


‘‘OLD SLOUCH’’ ON THE WARPATH 


out the window. He was so close, and he was so 
sure ! 

“ What are you looking at? ” came Butt’s voice 
behind him. Bill started and laughed nervously. . 

“ A barn, and some trees, and — and I think I 
see some more trees back of the barn,” he answered, 
turning abruptly from the window. 

“ Exciting sight. See if you can’t fix this tie for 
me, won’t you? One end of it wants to twist up, and 
I can’t make it stay down.” 

Bill tackled the tie, his thoughts still on the barn 
and the secret it held. 

“Come on. Bill! Wake up, can’t you?” Butt 
exclaimed. “ You won’t be ready for supper.” 

“Oh, Lord! Have we got to eat again? I had 
enough dinner to last me a week.” 

“ Sure — and we’ve got to look out for Effie’s 
cousins.” 

“ Thunder! I’d forgotten all about the cousins. 
Light the light, won’t you ? ” 

“ Why, I thought you were making quite a hit 
with them.” Butt lighted the lamp and sat down 
to wait. He was all ready himself. 

“ I made a hit by leaving them to you and 
Tommy.” Bill was burying into his clothes now, 
and losing time by it. “ Where’s that new collar 
I got this morning? ” 

“ ’Most dressed? ” came Colchester’s voice from 

147 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


the doorway. “ Golly, I’ve got to hurry up. I was 
fooling around out in the barn and I clean forgot 
about dressing for supper. Don’t wait for me. Go 
right down as soon as you’re ready.” 

They found Gray already there when they got 
downstairs, with the two cousins. Bill claimed to 
have a horror of girls, and he had successfully man- 
aged to keep at a comfortable distance from them 
so far to-day, with some one else always around so 
that it never became necessary for him to make con- 
versation all by himself. But now Butt and Gray 
deliberately monopolized the older cousin, leaving 
him to get along with Mildred the best he could. 
Mildred was very young and apparently very shy, 
which did not help, but Bill set himself to talk to 
her. 

“ I suppose we’re going to have a big time 
to-night, with all the dancing and all that,” he 
said politely. “ Have you ever heard the clubs be- 
fore ? ” 

“ No,” she answered, and conversation lan- 
guished while Bill racked his brain for another 
remark. 

“ Have you ever been in Tresham? ” he asked 
at length. 

“ No,” she answered again. “ But Gladys has,” 
she added after a pause. 

Bill could hear Gladys laughing and talking on 
148 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


the other side of the room. He wished Mildred 
were as easy to entertain. 

“ Did she like it? ” he pursued. 

“Oh, she loved it!” Mildred grew suddenly 
enthusiastic. “ Please, Mr. Bill, won’t you tell 
me about the things they do at college? I think 
they’re such fun. I love to hear Frank tell about 
them.” 

“ Frank? ” repeated Bill. 

She laughed shyly. 

“ Oh, you all call him Effie. I suppose it sounds 
funny to hear him called Frank.” 

“ Oh, I didn’t catch on to who you meant for 
a minute. ‘ Frank ’ does sound funny. I guess he 
must have told you about most of the things.” 

“ Oh, I know he hasn’t! ” 

“ Well, we get up in the morning, and we go to 
chapel, then we go to recitations, if we have any, and 
if we don’t we study, and then we eat and then go 
to some more recitations and study some more 
and ” 

“ You’re just making fun of me! ” 

“ No, Pm not, honestly ! Those are the things 
we do every day.” 

“ But they’re not the nice things ! Tell me about 
the things they do to freshmen, the hazing, you 
know, and all the other stunts, and Sabrina.” 

“ But those things come only once in a while. 

11 149 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Most of the time we just jog along, and not much 
of anything happens, just like anywhere else.” 

“ I don’t believe it! Frank tells me the loveliest 
things, and they’re not a bit like anywhere else.” 

“ I told you he hadn’t left me anything to tell 
about. I suppose you know all about Sabrina, for 
instance.” 

“ Oh, not nearly! Are you a Sabrina man? ” 

“ Yes; but I haven’t seen her yet.” 

“ Aren’t you just dying to? Frank told me all 
about the time he did. They went to New York, 
you know. And now she’s hidden away again, and 
nobody knows where she is, not a soul! ” 

Mildred’s pretty enthusiasm tempted Bill to 
tease her. 

“ Don’t you suppose even Effie — I mean Frank 
— knows? ” 

“ Frank? Mercy, no! If he had her he’d for- 
get where he put her, or else he’d forget and tell 
somebody who hadn’t any business to know, and 
that would be even worse. I guess you don’t know 
Frank very well or you’d never have thought of 
such a thing.” 

“ If nobody ever thought of such a thing, he’d 
be about the safest person to really know about 
her,” said Bill earnestly, forgetting that he had 
started in fun. “Don’t you think so?” 

“Why, Mr. Bill, that’s so, isn’t it? I wonder 
150 


“OLD SLOUCH’’ ON THE WARPATH 


if he really is the man? I’m going to ask him this 
very night.” 

“ Oh, I wouldn’t! ” Bill realized in sudden dis- 
may that he had probably been talking too much. 
“ Of course he isn’t! ” 

But Miss Mildred was not to be thrown off. 

“ But he may be ! Wouldn’t it be fun li he was ? 
Oh, Frank — ” she had caught sight of Colchester 
coming down the hall stairs and was out to meet 
him before Bill could utter another word of pro- 
test. “ Do you know where Sabrina is hidden? ” 

The others were attracted by her eager question, 
and everyone looked at her as she stood in the door- 
way, catching Colchester by the lapel^ of his coat 
and looking excitedly up into his face. 

Colchester’s eye moved quickly around the room, 
stopped an instant on Bill, who stood up, red and 
uneasy, and then rested on his small cousin. 

“ I ? ” he said, smiling. “ Why, nobody knows 
where she is hidden. She is a fairy, a goddess, and 
she flies here and there, wherever she will, and no 
man can tell where she is going to turn up next.” 

“ Nonsense, Frank! She’s nothing but a heavy 
old statue, and she can’t fly any more than you can. 
She’s hidden somewhere, and somebody knows 
where. Aren’t you that somebody — Honest In- 
jun? ” 

Butt and Gray seemed to think it was a very 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


good joke, but Bill thought there was a note of 
constraint in Colchester’s laugh. 

“ Of course not! What put such a crazy idea 
into your head, Pussy-cat?” 

“ I think it’s a very good idea, and Mr. Bill put 
it into my head. He thinks you’d be just the man 
to take care of her, because nobody would ever 
think you could do it.” 

The others laughed louder than ever, and Bill 
saw a momentary gleam in Colchester’s eye that 
must have meant something, but whether anger, or 
amusement, or what, he could not tell. 

“ That’s a sort of double-edged compliment,” 
Colchester said smiling. “ Fm glad you aren’t 
Meredith, Bill. Fd appreciate the honor of being 
her ladyship’s guardian, but it would be an awful 
lot of trouble.” 

Bill could think of nothing to say. He felt 
that while the others had been laughing and think- 
ing it was all a joke, between him and Colchester 
had been a silent battle of eyes, an unspoken chal- 
lenge and defiance that no one else in the room 
knew of. He was surer than ever now that he was 
right. Colchester knew where Sabrina was, for all 
his careless fibbing. But to have him know that he 
knew it — that spoiled all the fun and brought a ser- 
iousness into the game that meant the game must 
be dropped. It was no longer just amusement. 

152 


‘‘OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


“ I should think you would find her, Mr. Bill,” 
said Gladys, and Bill’ longed to flee from the room. 
He felt a tension in the atmosphere that Colchester’s 
serene smile only emphasized. If these girls would 
only stop talking about it, or at least leave him out 
of their talk! “Mr. Chanler has just been tell- 
ing what a wonderful detective you are, and Sabrina 
would be a lovely thing to get on the track of.” 

“ Bill’s a Sabrina man himself,” remarked Col- 
chester, and though he spoke to his cousin, his eyes 
were on Bill. “ He wouldn’t have any object in 
tracking down Sabrina.” 

“ I suppose not, but it would be such fun! Can’t 
you tell me something about me, Mr. Bill, — like 
those clever things you tell about the other men by 
just looking at them? ” 

Bill smiled uneasily, though rather relieved that 
Sabrina seemed to be dropping out of the con- 
versation. 

“I’m afraid I can’t. You see, the only things 
I ever hit on are rather queer, and I hit on them 
just because they are that. There isn’t anything 
queer about you.” 

“Good work. Bill!” cried Butt with a laugh. 
“ You’ll make a lady’s man yet.” 

“ Oh, that’s very nice, but I think you’re dodg- 
ing,” said Gladys, blushing prettily. But Mrs. Col- 
chester appeared at that moment and saved him the 

153 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

necessity of dodging any more by marshaling the 
whole company off to the dining room. 

All Stanfield, apparently, had turned out for 
the concert that night, and when the Colchester 
party arrived at the hall it was nearly time to be- 
gin. The clubs had collected under the stage, in a 
little room that seethed with preparation and ex- 
citement. To-night was the first really important 
concert of the year, and the big crowd that was 
pouring in upstairs created a nervous eagerness 
that put everything into a turmoil. Above the din 
of banjoes and mandolins being tuned Tod Smith 
was vainly trying to call the Glee Club together. 

“ Effie, for the Lord’s sake, help me round up 
these men ! ” he cried in despair. “ I’ve been bark- 
ing away for the last five minutes, and I can't 
make a soul hear in this racket. I want to run over 
the first song.” 

Together they coraled the Glee Club in a cor- 
ner and Smith lined them up. 

“ Now see if you can’t get into this and put 
some life into it without yelling your heads off,” 
he said sharply, for he had dropped his pitch pipe 
and had to chase it under a settee, which roughened 
his temper. “ We’ve got a good house upstairs 
and we’ve got to show ’em. Don’t get scared. 
There’s nothing to be nervous about. Walk out 
as if you were enjoying it, and not stand there 

154 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


like a lot of funerals. And for Heaven’s sake, 
keep on the pitch ! ” 

He blew a blast on his pitch pipe and waited till 
each one had his note. Then with a vigorous nod 
of his head he started them going. 

“ Oh, Lord! Not so loud! ” he shouted, throw- 
ing up his hands. “ Didn’t I tell you not to yell? 
They can hear you all over the house. Hum it! ” 

“Ready, Tod?” called the manager, sticking 
his head in at the door. “ We’re five minutes late 
already.” 

“ Shut that door! Yes, we’re ready if the rest 
are. You fellows get down here as soon as the first 
ensemble is over. You’re rotten on that song! 
Hurry up, now! ” 

Tod Smith was plainly the most nervous one 
of all, which did not have a cheering effect on the 
new men, for whom this night’s performance was 
more or less of a debut. But the opening ensemble 
went off with a dash that restored confidence, the 
second attempt to rehearse the song was more suc- 
cessful, and when they actually appeared before 
the audience Colchester and the other old-timers 
swung the thing through with a vim that carried 
it in spite of some wavering in the back row. At 
the end Tod Smith came off the stage with cold 
sweat on his brow, but smiling. 

“That’s an encore all right!” he whispered 

155 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


loudly, standing in the wing to measure the ap- 
plause. “ Now loosen up on this — smile a little. 
They like it if you look silly: only don’t look like 
a lot of dead ones. Go on, Effie ! ” And Effie led 
them forth upon the stage again. 

Having started well, it was easy to grow better, 
and the audience was enthusiastic enough to spur 
them on to the best that was in them. Bill knew the 
people liked it. He could see Mildred and her 
sister well up toward the front, beaming upon their 
big cousin, who was to them the hero of them all. 
But Bill’s thoughts kept straying away from the 
concert, for when the club had scattered after their 
first number Colchester had drawn him aside and 
asked him a question. 

“ Why have you been harping so much on Sa- 
brina the last two or three days? ” 

And Bill had answered truthfully enough: 

‘‘ I didn’t know I had been, especially. But 
if I have it’s because I’ve just begun to really 
know something about her, and I got interested.” 

“ Well,” Colchester’s deep voice had grown 
deeper and his face was very serious, ‘‘ remember 
you’re a Sabrina man. You’ve been in Tresham 
long enough to know that means we stand together. 
And you know what standing together means.” 

Bill thought he saw several “ meanings ” in 
that remark. First of all, there really was founda- 
156 


“OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


tion for his suspicions. Second, Colchester sus- 
pected that he had suspicions. But more than that, 
Colchester was evidently distrustful, so distrust- 
ful that he thought it necessary to speak a word 
of warning. Bill grew hot as he realized that. 
Colchester thought he did not understand the Sa- 
brina loyalty — that he might betray something if 
he knew anything to betray ! As that thought 
flashed upon him Bill rushed from where he stood 
to find Colchester and protest. It wasn’t fair. It 
wronged him terribly I But Colchester had dis- 
appeared. He was out in the audience, mingling 
with his fellow-townsmen and gathering in compli- 
ments to repeat to Tod Smith. So Bill found no 
chance to speak to him again while his impulse was 
hot to do so. After he had thought about it a 
little more he decided that it wasn’t worth bring- 
ing up again anyway; protests didn’t amount to 
much. 

Tod Smith was entirely pleased with the way 
things were going. His nervousness was gone now 
and instead of belaboring his songsters, he beamed 
and smiled upon them perpetually. To-night had 
been a crucial time with him. It was the first real 
test of his leadership, and the men he had been 
training for the last two months were being a credit 
to him. 

But the applause lured him to disaster. He 

157 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


could not resist it, even when they had exhausted 
all the encores they had practiced on, and toward 
the end of the concert, when they had finished the 
last Glee Club number and the audience still clapped 
for more, he signaled still again to go back on the 
stage. 

“ We’ll give ’em ‘ Schneider’s Band,’ ” he whis- 
pered. “ Go on, Effie.” 

“But we don’t know it!” protested a fresh- 
man, the freshman who sang second bass and had 
the reputation of getting “ scared silly.” 

“ S-sh! you don’t need to tell the audience about 
it! If you don’t know it make your mouth go 
and keep still. The old men can sing it. Here’s 
the pitch. Go on, now. They won’t stop clapping 
till we do. Go on, Effie ! ” 

Effie went on, the others uneasily following, and 
the banjo and mandolin men, who had gathered in 
the wings ready for the last ensemble, looked on 
and grinned. Their time of anxiety was over, and 
it pleased them greatly to gloat over their sing- 
ing rivals at this ticklish juncture. 

It was an old song the Club had sung often 
in years past, but they had not tried it this fall 
and the number of green men on the club was un- 
usually large. This suddenly came over Smith in 
a sickening flash as he stood watching them troop 
forth, but it was too late to back out now: most of 
158 


“OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


them were already on the stage. During the two 
seconds that it took to walk out to his place he 
almost prayed, then with a feverish look in his 
eye he nodded for the second bass to begin. 
Colchester, being the only second bass who 
knew the part, began the introduction alone — a 
gentle “ Pom-pom ! Pom-pom ! ” — and some one 
down in the audience began to giggle. Some one 
in the audience usually did giggle when they sang 
this song, but in his present state of tension Tod 
Smith forgot that. He felt sure something was 
wrong, and his uneasiness spread to the others, while 
Colchester kept up his rhythmic “ Pom-poming ” all 
by himself, with no one else joining in. More of 
the audience were giggling now, and out of the 
corner of his desperate eye Smith could see grinning, 
jeering faces in the wings. It would be a regular 
circus to those others to see the Glee Club go up in 
the air! 

Then he realized what was the matter. One 
man had always started the verse as a solo, be- 
cause it had to begin so softly, and that man was 
Phil Sands — back home now, with the bum throat. 
In desperation Smith plunged into the thing him- 
self, though his tenor voice was almost lost on 
those low notes. 

Soldiers marching up the street. 

To music grand, on every hand — ” 

159 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


Then others who knew it joined in, and it began to 
move, but Smith knew his knees were shaking. He 
stiffened his legs to stop them, while his head bobbed 
vigorously as a sign to sing louder. 

But suddenly the audience was laughing again, a 
ripple that spread and grew until it filled the hall. 
Smith felt a cold sweat breaking out all over him. 
What in pity’s name was the matter now? The 
first panic was over and the song seemed to be going 
all right, but there was a joke somewhere. As he 
looked at the other men their faces reflected a look 
of amazement as blank as his own. Then as they 
swung into the loud 

** Hear them ! The people cheer them ! ** 

he almost jumped at the sudden volume of sound 
that broke out from behind. One lightning glance 
showed him the banjo and mandolin men parading 
across the back of the stage in military file, holding 
their instruments before them like drums, upon 
which they beat in pantomime, and joining lustily 
in the song, with plenty of noise and a serene dis- 
regard of the words. 

The pallor on Smith’s face gave way to a burn- 
ing flush, and with an angry jerk of his head he 
commanded all eyes to the front. But he knew 
those figures were still going through their ridicu- 
lous maneuvers though they had stopped singing. 
i6o 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


He could see the audience watching them. Then as 
the song softened down toward the end they came 
tip-toeing stealthily out in front, a chair in one hand, 
a mandolin or banjo in the other, and at the last 
faint note they were all seated, instruments ready 
and hands poised. At the final bob of Tod Smith’s 
head they broke into the introduction of the closing 
ensemble before the audience had a chance for a 
single clap of applause. 

When it was over Bill made for the outside 
door to snatch a smoke before the dancing began. 
He could hear the thunder of Tod Smith’s wrath 
behind him— he had been made a goat of, and he 
was going to resign — he wouldn’t belong to such 
an aggregation of infants — it was no way to treat 
the leader of the Glee Club and the president of 
the organization. Bill smiled at his sputtering, and 
smiled more broadly as he looked back over his 
shoulder and saw Smith of a sudden lean limply 
against the wall and bend double with hysterical 
laughter. 

Bill lighted a cigarette and strolled out into 
the street. The air was chill, with the raw chill 
of November, and gray clouds covered the sky, but 
it was refreshing after the heat of indoors. The 
street was deserted, for all of Stanfield that was 
not abed was in the town-hall, waiting now for 
the seats to be shoved back from the floor so they 

i6i 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


could dance. Bill was not very keen about the danc- 
ing, and he prolonged his stroll, and turned a cor- 
ner into the main street. He finished one cigarette 
and went into a dark doorway where the wind 
did not blow to light another. Just as he was 
about to strike the match he heard hurrying foot- 
steps coming along the sidewalk, and almost im- 
mediately a tall figure hastened by. It was too 
dark to distinguish the face, but the man was hatless 
and coatless, and the white of his shirt bosom 
showed dimly as he passed. Bill started. He 
knew that figure. It was Colchester! The suspi- 
cion of secret doings, that had recurred to him 
more than once that day, seized him again. He 
stepped out of the shadow and followed. 

Colchester passed under a street lamp, and 
suddenly turned into the only lighted place on that 
side of the street. Bill went near enough to see 
that it was the telegraph office, and then stopped, 
his heart thumping excitedly. 

“ I’m right! I’m right! ” went singing through 
his brain. “ She’s here — here in Effie’s barn! ” 

Then he turned abruptly and ran back. There 
must be something doing — perhaps they were tak- 
ing her away! As he ran he tried to plan how 
he could see her, for see her he would, some way, be- 
fore she was gone. He did not stop running till 
he was back at the hall. 


162 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


The dancing had begun and Bill thought he 
could steal in, find his hat and coat, and get away 
again without being noticed. He had already 
formed a rather vague plan of going back to Col- 
chester’s house and getting into the barn — a pro- 
ceeding which in the excitement of the chase did 
not seem at all a questionable thing to do. The 
only thing he could think of was that here was a 
chance, perhaps, of doing what no man had ever 
done before — of seeing Sabrina in her hiding place. 
He wanted nothing more than that. He wouldn’t 
even tell anyone about it, at least for quite a while; 
but to succeed where others had continually failed 
for years and years — it set his pulse to pounding 
madly. 

But getting away was not so simple. There 
were three or four fellows in the room where his 
things were. Gray among them, and Gray hailed 
him. 

“ The small cousin is looking for you. Bill,” 
he said. “ She has an idea you’re going to dance 
with her.” 

“ Thunder, Tommy! I don’t want to dance! I 
can’t dance anyway! ” 

“ Well, go and talk to her then. I told her 
I’d find you for her.” 

Bill sighed resignedly and made for the hall. 
The small cousin was plainly waiting for him. 

163 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Oh, Mr. Bill, it was perfectly splendid! ” she 
cried. For some reason she seemed to have picked 
out Bill from the trio of Effie’s guests to be her 
particular friend. At any rate, toward him her 
earlier shyness had completely vanished, and she 
smiled radiantly at him as he sat down beside her. 
“ Now you’re going to ask me to dance with you, 
aren’t you? ” she inquired frankly. 

Sure; only if you say ‘ yes ’ I’m afraid you’ll 
be sorry. I’m not much of a dancer.” 

“ I think you’re joking. I’m going to say ‘ yes ’ 
anyway. I’m just crazy about dancing.” 

“ Come on, then 1 But you don’t know how 
courageous you are. What is this — a two-step? ” 

“Stupid! It’s a waltz, and you knew it all 
the time 1 ” 

Whether he had been joking or not. Bill man- 
aged to put up a pretty miserable exhibition of 
waltzing. The small cousin bit her lip and looked 
up at him with a suspicious eye, but he seemed to 
be trying so hard and was so in earnest in his 
failures not to bump into people that she finally took 
pity on him and stopped it. 

“ I told you,” he said apologetically. “ I can’t 
ever make my feet go where they ought to go.” 

“ Never mind, we can talk. The music is stop- 
ping anyway.” So they sat down and started to talk, 
while Bill was consumed with a most impolite de- 
164 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


sire to get up and run away. “ Oh, there’s Mr. 
Chanler! We have the next dance together. Do 
you know, I’m frightened to death I’ll call him 
‘ Butt ’ some time. It’s the loveliest name for him. 
Don’t you think he’s cute?” 

Bill laughed. “ Just say that to Butt and he’ll 
hate you for life. I think Butt wouldn’t mind 
being hanged if it would only stretch him out and 
make him six inches taller. He’s terribly sensi- 
tive about being so little.” 

“ Oh, I won’t say anything about it to himl ” she 
said earnestly. 

“ Hello, Butt I I’ve been giving Miss Col- 
chester an awful time. It’s up to you to make up 
for it.” 

“ It wasn’t awful at all,” she protested, rising 
as the music started. “ It is hard to dance here, 
there’s such a crowd.” 

Bill did not wait to dispute with her, he rushed 
precipitately for the dressing room and thanked 
his stars there was no one there to detain him fur- 
ther. He grabbed his coat and hat and hurried 
out, putting them on as he went. 

The Colchesters lived over a mile from the 
center of the town. Bill found there was a light in 
the house, but the barn was dark and deserted. It 
stood some distance from the house, and he circled 
it carefully, looking for some way to get in, but 
12 165 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


he did not dare strike a match and It was slow work. 
The big front door was securely fastened, as well 
as all the windows, but at length, after stumbling 
around in a sort of carriage-shed built alongside, 
he ventured to strike a light and discovered a 
ladder. With great care he dragged it out, making 
no noise at all, and set it up against a door on 
the second floor — the door through which the hay 
was pitched. After climbing up he found this, too, 
was locked, but near it was a window that stuck 
and squeaked, but finally yielded to his pushing. 
He looked about once more at the quiet house, and 
climbed in. 

He lighted another match and peered around. 
He was in what had apparently once been used 
for the stableman’s bedroom, and Bill had a sud 
den fear that there might be a stableman in the 
barn even now. But he could not remember having 
seen one during the day: he even remembered that 
Efiie had said something about their having to walk 
to town because the stable was out of commission. 
Anyway, he was not going to back out now for 
anything short of an armed resistance. 

There was a cot bed along the wall, and on a 
shelf, with a looking-glass and an old hair brush, 
a dusty stable lantern. He pounced upon it and 
shook it — there was still oil in itl In an instant 
he had it lighted and was out of the room. 

i66 



He sprang back, screening the lantern with his coat 


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OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


He found himself In a large hay loft, where 
huge shadows swelled and towered at each swing 
of the lantern. The thick smell of hay filled his 
nostrils, and every footstep stirred up a flurry of 
dust that set him coughing. There seemed to be 
hay everywhere, great stacks of It on each side of 
him, piled up to the roof, and between, an empty 
alleyway down which he now moved cautiously, 
holding the lantern at arm’s length. 

He realized his search would be hopeless If the 
statue was hidden up here. It might be burled any- 
where In that mass of hay. In the short time that 
he had, he might as well be hunting for a needle. 

Suddenly he stopped, on the verge of a yawning 
hole directly In his path. For a moment It startled 
him; then he saw that It must be the place where 
they pitched the hay Into the stalls. As he peered 
down, trying to direct the light so that he could see 
what was below, a heavy sound startled him. He 
sprang back, screening the lantern with his coat. He 
listened, a thrill quivering up and down his spine. It 
came again, a hollow, shivery sound as of some 
one striking heavily upon wood. A terror of some- 
thing unknown seized him, and he frantically 
wrapped the lantern in his coat to shut out every 
ray of light. 

Then he broke Into a nervous laugh. It was 
only a horse downstairs! The light had probably 
167 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


disturbed it, and the sound was its foot striking on 
the floor. Bill wiped the sweat from his forehead 
with the back of his hand and moved on. He 
would look downstairs. 

At length he found the way down. The light 
caused some more commotion, but Bill paid no fur- 
ther attention to it. There was only one horse: 
the other stalls were either empty or filled with 
rubbish. 

He looked carefully everywhere else and came 
back to the stalls. If it wasn’t upstairs, under the 
hay, it must be here, and if it wasn’t here he 
couldn’t find it. He stopped to listen for a moment. 
With all his caution and slow progress he had been 
over an hour. It must be almost time for the 
others to be coming home. Well, let them come. 
He hung the lantern on a hook and began his search. 

The first stall revealed nothing but a lot of 
farm tools and behind them some old, discarded 
furniture, and he went on to the next. At the 
first glance his heart leaped. It contained a lot of 
boxes, and one bigger than the rest with a piece 
of old carpet thrown over it. He grabbed off 
the covering and took down the lantern to look 
closer. 

The box must have been put there lately, for 
it was not packed in like the others. Eagerly he 
bent over it, measuring it with his eye. It seemed to 

i68 


“OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


be the right size. It was much scratched and battered, 
as if it had traveled far. There were iron bands 
around it, and one side, partly wedged in among 
the other boxes, was screwed on. On the front were 
big smears of paint, as if some old lettering had 
been painted over, and on the side — he squeezed 
himself into the stall to see better — there were 
more letters: 


“ F. E. COLCHESTER, Stanfield, Mas*.” 

Printed across the corner was the word “ Clocks^* 

As he read it he laughed aloud and jumped 
back. A box of clocks for Effie Colchester I It 
was a joke. It was too easy! 

He flung off his coat and hat, letting them fall 
unheeded on the floor, and began hunting for some- 
thing to use as a screwdriver. An old sickle with 
a blunted end was the best he could find, and with 
it he went to work. 

It was slow business, but one by one he removed 
the screws. He finished the front row of them, and 
then he had to move some of the other boxes to get 
at the screws in the back. That was a ticklish job, 
for he had to be careful not to set the whole pile 
tumbling over on him. Then he braced himself to 
shift the box around. 

At the first shove his heart sank. It moved 
without any difficulty at all. Feverishly he attacked 
169 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


the remaining screws. At last one of the broad 
boards was free and toppled over against him. 
For an instant he hesitated, and then thrust in his 
hand. The box was empty. 

He leaned limply back against the wall. He 
could have wept, but Instead he giggled hysterically. 
Fooled ! Effie had seen through him all along, and 
had played this joke on him I 

Then he sat down and began to think. No, It 
couldn’t be a joke. EfEe had been deadly serious 
when he spoke to him, and he wouldn’t be tele- 
graphing about a joke: Meredith wouldn’t have 
sent him that note about a joke. The statue had 
really been here, and somehow. In some secret man- 
ner, Colchester had got it away again. Perhaps 
Effie had been seeing that It was packed securely 
when he visited the barn In the afternoon with the 
hammer. And then, when they had all gone to the 
concert. It had been taken away. That’s what Effie 
had been telegraphing about I 

He got up wearily. He must put things as he 
had found them. Now, more than ever, he did not 
want anyone to know he had been prying around 
for the hidden statue. He replaced the board and 
the screws, and piled the boxes up again. Then he 
gathered up his coat and hat and went back to the 
room upstairs. When he had blown out the lantern 
and climbed out on the ladder he suddenly heard 
170 


OLD SLOUCH” ON THE WARPATH 


voices singing far down the road — Effie’s voice, 
and Butt’s, and the shrill treble of the girls: 

“ If you want to go to Tresham, 

Just come along with me. 

By the light, by the light of the moon. ” 

He had replaced the ladder and was sitting on 
the front steps when the others reached the house. 

“Oh, here’s Mr. Bill!” exclaimed Mildred. 
“We’ve had a glorious time!” 

“What’s the matter. Bill?” cried Colchester 
anxiously. “ We looked everywhere for you. We 
couldn’t think what in the deuce had become of you.” 

“ I wasn’t feeling very well. I thought I’d 
come on ahead.” 

“ Oh, you’ll feel better when you get something 
to eat. Mother said she’d leave some lunch out 
for us.” 

“ If you don’t mind, I think I’d like to go to 
bed,” Bill said as they stopped in the hall and Col- 
chester turned up the light. 

“You’re sick. Bill! You’re white as a sheet. 
I’ll call mother and have her get something for 
you.” 

“ No, no. I just want to go to bed. I’ll be all 
right in the morning.” And he started up the stairs. 
“ Please don’t bother about me. I’m all right, really. 
Good night.” 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


But Colchester insisted on going upstairs with 
him, and hovered over him till he was safe in bed. 

“ Sure I can’t do something for you, Bill? I’m 
awfully sorry! ” 

Bill forced a smile. His chief feeling at that 
moment was that he was thoroughly ashamed of 
himself. 

“ Don’t worry about me, Effie. You’re awfully 
good. I guess I’m just tired out.” 

Colchester turned down the light and left him. 

“ Be sure and let me know if you want any- 
thing.” 

“ Yes; good night.” And Bill turned over and 
hid his face in the pillow. 


CHAPTER VIII 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 

B ill was all right the next morning, just as 
he had said he would be, but they made a lot 
of fuss over him to which he had to submit as 
gracefully as he could. It was the penalty for re- 
treating to bed as he had the night before. He wore 
a subdued air, which they took for illness, but it was 
really because he was afflicted with remorse. On 
sober reflection it seemed pretty poor business, break- 
ing into the Colchesters’ barn like a thief while he 
was a guest at their house. Perhaps he would not have 
looked at it so soberly if he had found what he was 
looking for. But as it was, the disappointment had 
a chastening effect, and now that the excitement was 
all over and had amounted to nothing, he told him- 
self he had been a prying fool. Maybe that box 
had never held the statue at all. Nevertheless, he 
felt sure it had. 

They left on an early afternoon train for the 
next concert, and the cousins went with them as 
far as the next town, where they lived. Bill had 

173 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


an additional touch of remorse because he had de- 
ceived the younger one about his dancing. She had 
been particularly nice to him all that morning: she 
was so sorry he was not well! And though he did 
not tell her she was a “ nice kid,” that was what he 
thought, and in the way he meant it, it was the 
finest compliment he could pay her. 

The concert that night was not a highly success- 
ful one. It rained for one thing, a chill November 
rain that kept people away, and they were in a 
town where none of the fellows had any particular 
friends to stir up enthusiasm for them. Tod Smith 
was grouchy; he swore he’d never heard the club sing 
so badly — which didn’t help matters — and the whole 
thing dragged itself through in a spiritless fashion 
that made them all glad when it was over. 

The next morning they were routed out of bed 
before daylight to take an early train that would 
get them back to Tresham in time for chapel. The 
Thanksgiving recess was over, and it was back to 
work till the Christmas holidays. 

Bill did not return in very gay spirits. He had 
made up his mind to dismiss Sabrina from his 
thoughts for good and all, but the sting of dis- 
appointment stayed by him and would not be ban- 
ished. He had been so sure that he was on the right 
track: he was still sure he had been, and to have 
it all lizzie out so hurt his pride. He argued with 

174 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


himself that, no matter how acute he had been, the 
result could not have been any different — the statue 
simply wasn’t there for him to find; but that was 
small comfort. To have come so near, and then 
miss, was almost heartbreaking. He tried to be 
philosophical and say that even if he had succeeded 
he would have gained nothing. It would do him 
no good to find Sabrina, for he was a Sabrina man 
himself, bound in honor not to betray the secret of 
her hiding place even if he knew it. But that was 
not the point. He was not looking to gain anything. 
It was the hunt for the hunt’s sake that had drawn 
him on, and the secret pride of having succeeded 
would have been his reward. 

He kept thinking and puzzling over the mystery 
of that empty box. How long had it been empty? 
Had Colchester’s visit to the barn that afternoon, 
taking him away from their merry-making, had any- 
thing to do with it? If so, what? But there was 
no use in speculating on it. He had come as near 
as he could to answering questions of that kind : not 
once in years was such luck even as he had had likely 
to come to anyone, and it would not come to him 
again. He had better get what satisfaction there 
was out of having made as much as he could out of 
it. But he could not help finding that rather cold 
satisfaction at best. 

That afternoon he learned that Colchester had 

175 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


not returned with the clubs, which set him specu- 
lating anew. The obvious explanation was that he 
had gone back home for Sunday: that was what 
everyone thought. But just now Bill was not in a 
frame of mind to accept obvious explanations. He 
had it on the authority of Sherlock Holmes himself 
that the deepest of mysteries were often to be found 
beneath the most commonplace, every-day kind of 
happenings, and in his present absorption in the 
secret of Sabrina’s whereabouts he would have seen 
a hidden meaning even in the mere fact that Colches- 
ter might chance to go uptown on the right-hand side 
of the street instead of the left. 

He spent a good deal of time regretting that 
he had not kept a more watchful eye on Colchester 
after that fruitless venture into the barn. If he had 
only been more alert instead of foolishly losing all 
his enthusiasm simply because he had run up against 
a temporary failure, he might have discovered a 
clue really worth while. Why hadn’t he seen when 
EfEe left them, and found out all the whys and 
wherefores of it? Was it immediately after the 
concert or the next morning? And where had he 
really gone? 

But after all Bill was not the sort of fellow to 
waste much time on what might have been. Once 
he saw that there was really nothing to be done, 
he stopped regretting and tried to put it out of 
176 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


mind, with a tiny hope tucked away in the bottom 
of him that something might turn up after all that 
would make it all right. 

Colchester came back Monday morning, big 
and serene as ever, and anxious in a friendly way 
about the state of Bill’s health. And Bill had to 
protest all over again that there was nothing the 
matter with him. There were kindly messages 
from the Colchester family, and Bill had to admit 
that if Effie hadn’t been home over Sunday he was 
a very successful deceiver — ^which didn’t seem at all 
like Effie. 

At length it became clear that, as far as any like- 
lihood of his discovering it went, there was 
nothing doing in the Sabrina line at all, and Bill 
sensibly gave up bothering about it. He could not 
be forever spying upon Effie Colchester, and a little 
serious thought showed him that even if he could 
it would be a mean return for the friendship the 
senior was giving him, especially when his sole ob- 
ject was to satisfy a curiosity about something that 
was after all not any of his business. 

Besides, there were other things to think about. 
Just before Christmas the despised Herbie Nichols 
came to the fore again, and because Chanler and 
Burnet were concerned, it concerned Bill. 

Nichols had not been having a very happy time. 
Though the sophomores who knew of it had agreed 
177 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


to say nothing about Nichols’s little joke on his 
classmates in the early fall, he had not been able to 
keep Rowson silent for very long, and after a time 
the details of McCarthy’s kidnapping became pretty 
generally known. If Nichols had been a different 
kind of fellow that probably would not have 
amounted to anything. It might even have seemed 
as funny as he intended it to be. But Nichols was 
unfortunately just what he was, not likable at best, 
and with what good points he did have so effectually 
concealed that most people never took the trouble 
to ferret them out. He was not bright. He had 
come to Tresham because he had flunked out of 
Harvard the spring before, and was a sophomore 
only on probation. He was not attractive in any 
way; he had no accomplishments at all, social, ath- 
letic, or intellectual, and he was hopelessly given to 
talking a great deal and very loudly about things 
that were utterly uninteresting — very often about 
himself. 

Coming to Tresham without any friends at all, 
and getting in wrong with Chanler and McCarthy 
at the very first, it was not strange that he found it 
hard to make a place for himself that was worth 
anything. Butt and Mac were probably the two 
most popular men in the class. Butt simply because 
he could not help it, and Mac because in addition to 
being a good fellow he was the star pitcher on the 
178 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


baseball team and the winner of many a crucial game 
on the diamond. Either one of them, by merely 
being friendly, could have done a lot for Nichols, for 
where they led others followed. But their attitude 
was decidedly the opposite, and though they did not 
intentionally show it, it was plain enough to anyone 
who saw much of them. The result was that Nich- 
ols had to seek companions among those to whom 
Butt’s and Mac’s likes and dislikes made no differ- 
ence at all, and so great was the hold of these two 
upon their classmates that such ones were pretty few 
and of the kind that one would not willingly make 
special cronies of. 

Whatever Nichols’s shortcomings were, he saw 
plainly enough that he was not making any headway 
with the fellows who amounted to anything In his 
own class, and out of sheer loneliness he one day 
gathered together his belongings and had them 
carted up to a vacant room In the Dorms. He be- 
longed to no fraternity and no one he cared about 
ever came to his room, so there was nothing to do 
but go where he could at least be among a crowd, 
if not of It. 

The room he took was on the same floor as 
Burnet’s, and Burnet, because he had an exceed- 
ingly kind heart, was nice to his new neighbor. 
Poor Nichols responded gratefully, and If he did 
not exactly blossom under the new treatment, he at 
179 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


least showed that he was not altogether what Haw- 
kins had once called him — a “ mutt.” He poured 
forth the tale of his loneliness to this kindly fresh- 
man, who was too polite not to listen even if he had 
not felt rather sorry for his visitor, with the result 
that Nichols went back to his own room late that 
night feeling that at last he had found a friend. 
Later on Burnet was inclined to wish he had not 
been so sympathetic, for Nichols got to coming often 
and staying long, and, at best, too big doses of him 
got tiresome. Besides, other friends of his looked 
askance at this new companionship: they even went 
further and started criticizing it. 

“ What in thunder do you have that fruit hang- 
ing around all the time for? ” they asked. But that 
made Burnet stubborn, and he was more friendly 
to Nichols than ever. 

At length Butt got wind of it, and in his role 
of adviser and old friend he, too, protested. 

“ Now what’s the use of talking like that. 
Butt?” Burnet answered. “You know me well 
enough to know it won’t do any good. It isn’t do- 
ing me or anyone else any harm to be decent to 
him.” 

“ I didn’t say it was. But it’s such a waste of 
time. I should think you’d have found out that he 
isn’t your kind from just the little time he passed 
himself off as a classmate of yours.” 

i8o 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


“ Of course you think that, and that’s what is 
so unfair. That man has had a downright miserable 
time all the fall, and just because you all judged 
him by that one thing and decided he was no good. 
You know that a new man hasn’t any chance of 
getting in with the nice fellows in your class when 
he starts in with your crowd and McCarthy’s down 
on him the first thing, especially when he — well, 
when he’s like Nichols.” 

“But doesn’t that prove he’s no good? We 
haven’t said anything against him, and if he had 
anything to him he’d make friends fast enough. 
That’s what I mean when I say you’re wasting your 
time.” 

Burnet shrugged his shoulders. 

“ I’ll admit he’s pretty far from being a star, 
but that isn’t admitting that I’m wasting my time. 
My time is my own, and I should feel like a rotten 
old snob if I didn’t try to be halfway decent to him. 
Lord knows he’s lonely enough: nobody else has 
anything to do with him, and it’s a good deal your 
fault.” 

“ I’d like to know how you make that out! ” 
cried Butt indignantly. 

“ I’ve told you already, and you know it just 
as well as I do.” 

“ Would you mind saying it over again? ” Butt 
spoke with the restrained calm of one who argues 
13 i8i 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


with an unreasonable child. “ I may be stupid, but 
I didn’t catch your point.” 

“ That’s right — get sore ! What I said was that 
you queered him at the very beginning, and he knows 
it. There isn’t a man in your class he’d rather have 
like him than you.” 

Butt was silent. To tell the truth, he had never 
thought of his popularity as a thing that had any 
special influence. He knew that the fellows appar- 
ently all liked him, and he was proud of it, but it 
had never occurred to him that their liking might 
lead them so far as to make them accept his judg- 
ment of anybody without having some grounds to 
form the same judgment on their own account. It 
seemed impossible and ridiculous. The fact that 
he and his classmates had agreed so unanimously 
about Nichols was proof positive that they were 
right — he simply was not worth while. 

But in spite of his certainty of this, Burnet’s 
words had some result. Butt always wanted to be 
fair, and rather than have Nichols feel, however 
unjustly, that he had been exercising a hostile in- 
fluence, he resolved to do what he could to make 
amends. 

“ I know you’re wrong. Bunny,” he said. “ At 
least about my having made any difference. That’s 
all rot. But if it will ease your mind any I’ll seek 
out your man and make peace with him. I don’t 
182 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


want any shattered careers on my conscience even 
when it’s all imagination.” 

And he straightway went to Nichols and was 
what Burnet would have called “ decent ” to him. 
Nichols was surprised and so humbly grateful that 
Butt came away feeling that he had wronged the 
man, and determined to make up for it. 

So things began to look up for the lone sopho- 
more. He did not find himself any more sought 
after than before, but to be on friendly terms with 
Butt Chanler, even if he did not see so very much 
of him, was a great comfort, for to him Butt seemed 
one of the finest fellows that ever trod the earth. 
And he knew that he owed it all to Burnet, and his 
gratitude took the form of haunting Burnet’s room 
all the more, which wore on even that kind-hearted 
freshman at times. But Burnet continued to de- 
fend him as stoutly as ever when anyone took it 
upon himself to make remarks. Both he and Butt 
had to put up with a good deal of joshing about 
their “ crush.” 

So Bill came to see more or less of Nichols, too. 
He could not easily help it when he went to the 
Dorms to see Burnet, for Nichols seemed to be per- 
petually there. For Burnet’s sake he made no com- 
ment, and successfully concealed the fact that he 
thought Nichols the most tiresome man he had ever 
known. But Nichols was keen enough when it came 

183 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


to discovering whether people liked him or not; he 
even realized that there was a touch of toleration in 
Butt’s attitude toward him, and he saw plainly that 
for all his politeness Bill wished he would keep out 
of the way. All of which aroused a certain streak 
of malice in him, and made him keep in the way as 
much as he could. 

Suddenly, out of this tiresome but seemingly 
harmless association, burst a small-sized thunderbolt. 

Bill had gone up to Burnet’s room one evening. 
The Christmas vacation was only three days away, 
and he had been waiting to hear from his family be- 
fore deciding whether to go home for the holidays 
or to stay East and spend part of them with Butt and 
Burnet. A letter had just come from his father. 

He found Burnet working hard at a new type- 
writer. Having literary aspirations. Bunny wished 
to own all the tools of the trade, and this latest pur- 
chase was at least useful in making his themes legible. 

“ You’d save time by using both hands,” ob- 
served Bill after he had watched Burnet for a few 
minutes laboriously picking out the letters with one 
forefinger. 

“ Probably, but Pm going to learn this way 
first,” was the serene response. 

‘‘ Oh, very well, I don’t mind.” Bill sauntered 
over to the fireplace and dropped another stick of 
wood on the fire. “ Nice dry wood you have.” 

184 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


No response at all this time. 

“ A fire is very cheerful to-night. It’s quite 
chilly out.” 

Still Burnet kept pegging at his machine. 

‘‘ Well, I guess I’ll be moving along. I just 
dropped in to tell you that it would give me great 
pleasure to accept your kind invitation for Christ- 
mas and that ” 

“Oh, Billy! Good work!” Burnet jumped up 
from his typewriter, all enthusiasm. “ Did you hear 
from home? ” 

“ Yes. The folks are coming on to New York 
the first of the week. And say, don’t you suppose 
you and Butt can go down for New Year’s? They 
say that’s always a big time in New York, and I 
want you and the folks to know each other, my kid 
brother especially. He may come to Tresham in a 
couple of years, if the old gent is satisfied with the 
way I do here.” 

Burnet looked thoughtfully into the fire. 

“ Gee, I’d like to. You know I’ve never been to 
New York. Have you asked Butt yet ? ” 

“ I haven’t had a chance. He’s gone to one of 
his old Honor System meetings and I didn’t get this 
letter till after supper. Say, Bunny, it’ll be great 
fun if you can go ! ” 

And they talked at length about what they would 
do if they went to New York and what they would 
185 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


-do at Burnet’s home, till finally Bill remembered 
that he had work to do and must get back to his 
room. 

“ By the way,” he remarked as he stood with his 
hand on the doorknob, ready to go, “ what’s the 
matter with your friend Herbie to-night? ” 

“ Nothing that I know of. Why?” 

‘‘ Oh, he isn’t around. I thought something must 
be the trouble. Well, good night. Don’t try to 
write that letter home on your typewriter. You want 
to get it off some time this week.” 

Out in the hall he met Butt on his way to Bur- 
net’s room. 

“ Just the man I want ! ” he exclaimed. “ Going 
in to see Bunny? ” 

“ Yes. Wait for me, won’t you? I want to see 
you, too — afterwards.” 

“ I’m going home with you for Christmas,” Bill 
said eagerly, turning back with him, “ and you and 
Bunny have got to go down to New York with me 
later — the folks are going to be there ! ” 

Butt said something about how glad he was, and 
maybe he could go, but when they were inside and 
seated around the fire again, it was Bill and Burnet 
that did most of the talking and planning. 

“Wake up. Butt! ” exclaimed Bill after a few 
minutes. “ Haven’t you any interest at all? ” 

“ Sure I have. I know we’ll have a good time. 

i86 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


We’ll see Walter Welles, too. You don’t know him 
but you’ll like him. He started in with our class last 
fall. He was class president while he was here, but 
his father died and he had to leave.” 

“Show a little enthusiasm then: you act as 
though you didn’t care. Oh, thunder!” he ex- 
claimed, lowering his voice, for the door had 
opened and Nichols entered. “ I knew he’d show 
up! ” 

Nichols’s coming put an end to their planning 
and Bill and Butt got up to go. 

“ Oh, Bunny, how’s the work going? ” asked 
Butt, picking up something from the mantel and 
making a pretense of examining it. 

“ All right, I guess,” was the casual response. 
Burnet was preparing to sit down at the typewriter 
again. 

“ Math bothering you any? ” 

“ Math always bothers me, but I think I’m above 
the passing mark.” 

“ Haven’t you been having some tests lately? ” 

“ Oh, we have them all the time. We had one 
— let’s see — Tuesday, wasn’t it. Herb?” 

Nichols nodded. He had had to repeat Fresh- 
man Math this year. 

“ I flunked it dead,” Burnet added. “ Have they 
been reporting me down in it? ” 

“No, not exactly. But we fellows down at the 

187 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


house have to keep track of the kind of work you 
freshmen do.” Butt spoke hurriedly, and started 
for the door. “Good night!” he said, and has- 
tened out. 

Bill had to run down the stairs to keep up with 
him. 

“What’s the matter with you. Butt?” he de- 
manded, catching up with him as they reached the 
walk outside. 

Butt did not answer at once. 

“ What do you think of Bunny? ” he asked sud- 
denly. 

“ Think of him? Why, I think he’s all right, of 
course. I like him a lot.” 

“ You think he’s straight and square, don’t 
you? ” 

Bill stopped short and took Butt by the arm. 

“What’s the matter with you? What’s up?” 
he cried. 

“ Oh, I’ll tell you. I’ve got to tell somebody, and 
you — Bill, you can find out things the rest of us 
can’t, sometimes, just fooling. For Heaven’s sake, 
see if you can’t do it in something that counts. This 
means a lot ! ” 

“ But tell me what it is I ” 

“ You know the Honor System committee had 
a meeting to-night, and you know what that 


means. 


i88 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


‘‘Some one’s been caught cribbing? It 
wasn’t ” He stopped. 

“ Yes: it was Bunny.” 

“ Well, he didn’t do it. You can bet on that! ” 

“ I know he didn’t. Why, I’ve known Bunny 
Burnet ever since we were kids. It isn’t in him to do 
a thing like that ! But it looks as though he did.” 

Bill shook his head in exasperation. 

“ Don’t you suppose I could guess that much, if 
it has gone into the committee’s hands? What I 
vant to know is all about it. When did it happen? 
Who thinks he did it?” 

“ The Math instructor, and the rest of the com- 
mittee.” 

Bill said nothing, but waited. 

“ I haven’t any right to be telling you this. We 
aren’t supposed to tell what goes on in the commit- 
tee meetings — but I’ve got to do something! Can’t 
you help me. Bill? You’ve got to help me! I got 
them to agree not to do anything just yet because I 
know him so well and I’m so sure of him. They’re 
going to let me investigate a little. But there isn’t 
much time ; they won’t wait forever.” 

“Why didn’t you ask Bunny himself? Prob- 
ably he could clear up the whole thing.” 

“ I was going to to-night — that’s what I went up 
to his room for. But I couldn’t get up my nerve to, 
and then Nichols came in. I couldn’t then anyway. 
189 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


But you heard me ask about that test. If there’s 
been anything unusual about that he’d have spoken 
about it, or a least shown it. Bunny can’t be mixed 
up in anything that’s crooked without showing it the 
first thing.” 

They were outside Mrs. Sleeper’s and Butt 
stopped till they were upstairs in Bill’s room. But 
then he seemed disinclined to go on; he just sat 
glumly in a chair, saying nothing. 

“ Who found it out? ” asked Bill. 

“ The professor — and he reported it.” 

“ But I thought this Honor System business was 
all run by the students and the faculty kept out.” 

“ They do, except when they come across a case 
where it’s perfectly plain, or at least pretty suspi- 
cious, and then they have to report it to the student 
committee. After that it’s in the students’ hands. 
They investigate it, and if they find it really seems 
to be a case of cribbing they give the man a chance 
to clear himself if he can, and if he can’t they report 
him to the faculty and recommend what they think 
ought to be done to him.” 

“ How about this case? ” 

“ Oh, it’s cribbing, all right. It was in that Math 
test last Tuesday. Bunny’s work has been poor for 
some time, but the professor likes him and he’s been 
trying to help him outside of the class and make him 
buck up. When he came to correct these papers he 
190 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


found Bunny’s was a mighty good one — they’d been 
given five problems, but only four were required, and 
Bunny had the answers to four of them right. The 
professor was pleased, but he was surprised, and he 
started to look over the work. He found that the 
last part of every single problem had been erased 
and done over again, and the part that was done 
over was copied.” 

‘‘ How does he know that? Bunny might have 
worked them over again without copying them.” 

“ But the working over didn’t fit on to the first 
part at all. It’s plain enough that the things were 
copied.” 

Bill snorted with impatience. 

“ Rot! How do you know they were copied? ” 

“ They look as if they had been.” 

“ Butt Chanler, you’ve lost every smack of com- 
mon sense you ever had — and the whole thing looks 
to me as though your Math man had run into trouble 
on pretty slim evidence. What kind of evidence do 
you call that? Why, it’s just another proof that 
they’re mistaken. If Bunny ever did take to crib- 
bing, he’d do it intelligently. He wouldn’t leave 
part of his own work and part of another man’s that 
didn’t fit together.” 

‘‘ But it was Bunny’s book, all right. I saw it.” 

Bill sat for a few moments thinking, while Butt 
got up and walked nervously back and forth. 

191 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Do you know whose paper the problems were 
copied from? ” he asked at length. 

“ No. It might have been anybody’s that had 
the problems done right.” 

“ But you said one of them was wrong. Was 
that one copied, too? ” 

“ I suppose so, if the others were. I’m not sure.” 

Bill stood up. 

“ You ought to have looked through all the 
other papers and found the one that had that same 
wrong problem done in the same wrong way.” 

Butt stopped his pacing, and gripped the back of 
a chair excitedly. 

“ I never thought of that! ” he cried. Then the 
hopeful look died out of his face. “ But what good 
would it do anyway? We’d know the man it was 
copied from, but that wouldn’t help us.” 

“ It might. Maybe those problems weren’t cop- 
ied. Bunny may have done them on another piece 
of paper and then copied the last part of ’em with- 
out changing the first parts. Perhaps that’s all he 
had time to do. Perhaps — Oh, all sorts of things I 
The sensible thing would be to ask Bunny himself. 
He probably could explain the whole thing.” 

“ Oh, I know that. But I hate to have him know 
that’s he’s even suspected of such a thing! I want 
to clear it up myself if I can.” 

“ Well, maybe Can’t you get hold of 

192 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 

those papers? We might make something out of 
them.” 

Butt drew out his watch. 

“ Half past nine. You wait I I’ll get ’em if I 
can. I think Morty ’ll let me take ’em : he wants to 
see Bunny cleared as much as anyone.” 

Butt did not wait to put on his overcoat. He 
grabbed his cap and dashed out of the room. It was 
nearly an hour before he returned, with a pile of 
blue-covered notebooks under his arm. 

“ I’ve got ’em ! ” he cried, out of breath. 

“ Did you have to get out a warrant for them? ” 

“ No; I went up to see Bunny first. I thought 
he might be able to explain it, after all, and there 
wouldn’t be anything else to do. But he can’t.” 

“What did he say?” 

Butt pulled out his handkerchief and wiped his 
forehead. 

“ Nichols was there and I had to ask him to get 
out, and then I told Bunny. He says he did the 
problems over several times, and did a lot of eras- 
ing. But he got ’em different every time, and he’s 
pretty sure he didn’t get the right answers any time. 
If he did, it was just luck: he didn’t copy from 
anybody else. He says he couldn’t have, anyway, 
without being seen, because there were several fel- 
lows still at work there when he got discouraged 
and quit. He’s terribly excited about it. He swears 

193 . 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


there’s some mistake, and he wanted to go right 
down to Professor Mortimer’s and thresh it out to- 
night, but I got him to wait till to-morrow.” 

Bill picked up the top blue book. 

“ Let’s look at them. If we can’t find another 
that’s just like his, it’s pretty good proof that his 
wasn’t copied. Where’s his book? ” 

Butt picked it out from the pile and Bill looked 
at it. 

“ He had the third problem wrong. What we 
want is to find another fellow that had this same 
problem done the same way.” 

“I hope we won’t find any!” said Butt fer- 
vently, and they began their search. 

For twenty minutes the quick turning of pages 
was the only sound in the room. Then Butt seized 
Burnet’s paper suddenly, and a moment later uttered 
a sharp cry. 

‘‘What is it?” cried Bill. 

“ There it is ! ” Butt threw down the two books 
with a despairing gesture. 

Bill picked them up and compared them care- 
fully. 

“ They’re exactly alike,” he said at length. 
“ Everything: — except the parts he didn’t erase.” 

Butt said nothing; he simply stared at Bill in 
glum silence. 

“ Who is this man Hopper — the one they were 
194 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 

— well, the one it looks as though they were copied 
from? ” 

“ Oh, I know him. He’s a shark. He gets A’s 
in everything. Will you blame them for suspecting 
Bunny now? He had every reason to crib, and the 
other man didn’t, and there’s about as much evidence 
as anyone could want.” 

Bill made no answer, but took Burnet’s book 
closer to the light and stood studying it closely. 

“ Butt ! ” he called sharply. “ Come here ! ” 

Butt jumped to his side. 

Look — at that ‘ x ’ there. Now look at this 
other. See?” He pointed eagerly, and Butt put 
his head down close to examine. “ Bunny made 
that one, and he didn’t make this. See the differ- 
ence? Bunny’s is a plain, clean cross, and this other 
one has a loop, all made without taking the pencil 
off the paper. Look, they’re all like that in the part 
that was copied.” 

Butt stared for a moment, and then a smile ap- 
peared and grew on his face. 

“ Then he didn’t do it ! ” he cried. 

“ Of course he didn’t ! ” Bill beamed trium- 
phantly. 

Butt dropped the book and sat down, his eyes 
radiant. 

“ By golly! ” he exclaimed softly. “ I’m glad! ” 

They sat and looked at each other, and smiled, 

195 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

and then laughed. At length Butt sprang to his 
feet. 

“ We must tell him,” he cried. “ He’ll be lying 
awake thinking about it. We mustn’t make him 
wait till morning before he knows it’s all cleared 
up.” 

Together they hurried out of the room and down 
the stairs, leaving the light still burning, and dashed 
hatless into the street. But they had only reached 
the foot of the campus hill when they met Burnet, 
hurrying, hatless, too, to their room. 

“ Oh, I’ve been down to the house and every- 
where looking for you!” he cried. “I want to 
talk about it I But the other fellows didn’t know 
and I — I somehow couldn’t tell them.” 

“Cheer up. Bunny!” exclaimed Butt joyfully. 
“ You didn’t do it I ” 

“ I know I didn’t, but they think I did, and that’s 
just as bad.” 

“ Come on back to the room,” said Bill, linking 
arms with the other two. “ We can prove you 
didn’t do it. That ought to hold them I ” 

“ How? ” Burnet questioned eagerly. 

“ Easiest thing in the world: just by comparing 
your letters and figures with the ones that were 
copied.” 

“ But there wasn’t anything copied. All the 
letters and figures in my book were my own! ” 

196 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 


“ No, they weren’t I You wait till you see them.” 

They hurried him into the house and upstairs, 
and showed him the book. 

“Are they, now?” Butt asked. 

Burnet needed only a glance at the paper. 

“ But who did it? ” he demanded. 

“ I don’t know, but it was copied from Hopper’s 
paper — you can see it’s just the same, mistakes and 
all.” 

A slow flush mounted Burnet’s face. 

“ Do you think — ” He stopped, as if the very ’ 
thought was hard to utter. “ Some one — do you 
think some one dislikes me so much that he’s tried 
this way to get me into trouble ? ” 

They had not thought of that, they were so glad 
to have found proof of Burnet’s innocence. 

“ Of course not. You haven’t an enemy in 
the world. Bunny I But what would anybody want to 
do such a thing for?” Butt knew the idea was 
ridiculous, but it grew on him. What other ex- 
planation was there? 

“ We’ll find out, if it was anybody in the class,” 
Bill cried, seizing the pile of books. “ Go through 
them all : start at the beginning, and look for some 
* x’s ’ like these. That may track him.” 

Feverishly they went at the blue books again, 
studying and comparing, starting with the beginning 
of the alphabet. Burnet was the one to find the 
14 197 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


first striking similarity. Long and carefully he com- 
pared the letters and figures in the book he held with 
those in his own book. Then he laid them both down, 
open, on the table. 

“ There It Is,” he said. His flushed face had 
paled and he spoke In a voice that was curiously 
calm and repressed. 

Together Bill and Butt bent over the two books. 

“ By George, it Is ! ” Bill started to turn over 
the book to see the name on the front, but Burnet 
snatched It away and put It behind him. 

“Whose Is it?” 

Burnet stared at them for a moment, coldly and 
defiantly. Then In a sudden burst of anger he hurled 
the book at the wall. 

“ I don’t care who knows It! ” he shouted, his 
voice rising and breaking. “ He’s played me dirty! 
It’s Nichols!” 

They simply stared at him, as he stood with 
fists clenched and eyes filling. Then Bill went over 
and picked up the book. 

“ It Is Nichols,” he said. “ Herbert P. Nichols.” 

For minutes, almost, the three stood there, and 
no one said a word. Then Burnet relaxed his tense 
attitude and sat down In a chair. 

“ I don’t see why he did It,” he said brokenly. 

“Well, I’ll find out!” cried Butt, stepping for- 
ward resolutely. “ I’ll find out to-night! ” 

198 


A TROUBLOUS INTERLUDE 

“ Walt a minute ! ” Burnet reached out his hand 
as if to stop him. “ I want to think a minute.” 

“Think! There’s no two ways of thinking 
about this thing at all. He did it. There’s the 
proof! I don’t know what dirty, mean purpose he 
had underneath it all, but he did it all right. And 
he’ll get what’s coming to him for it! ” 

“Wait!” Burnet repeated. And they waited, 
while he sat there thinking, his elbows on the table 
and his hands clutching his hair. “ I can’t make it 
out,” he said finally. “ I can’t see why he did it. 
Why, he was in again after Butt was up; and I told 
him about it. And he never gave a sign ! But don’t 
do anything to-night — please don’t. See him in the 
morning, and — What will they do to him? ” 

“ Fire him ! ” said Butt decidedly. 

“ See him in the morning and tell him they will 
fire him, and try to get him to go himself. Don’t 
you see ? I don’t want people to know he’s done this 
thing to me! It’s bad enough to have him do it, 
but I don’t want people to know!” 

“ Well, you are a funny one ! What’s the harm 
of that? He deserves it! ” exclaimed Butt. 

“I think I see,” said Bill. “Do that. Butt! 
See him to-mor(|pw, and tell him the case is as plain 
as day against him, and get him to leave quietly 
without any having to. You can make him if anyone 
can.” 

199 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

“ But that’s so — so — I don’t see the object of 
it!” 

“ It’ll make it easier for Bunny if people don’t 
know about it. Don’t you see? Bunny’s been his 
friend, the best friend he’s had here, and it isn’t 
very pleasant to have everybody know a fellow 
you’ve gone out of your way to be decent to has 
turned and played you a dirty trick like that.” 

Butt saw, dimly, though it seemed more to him 
as if Burnet dreaded the inevitable “ I told you so ” 
than anything else. But he didn’t blame him for 
that, and he agreed to what they asked. 

‘‘Can I stay down here to-night. Bill?” asked 
Burnet wearily. “ I don’t want to go back to the 
Dorms.” 

“ Sure : you can have either the couch or the 
bed.” 

“ I’ll take the couch. And I think I’ll go to bed 
now.” 

And to bed he went, and the other two talked in 
whispers so as not to disturb him. But it was long 
after Butt had gone and Bill had gone to bed himself 
before Bunny went to sleep. 


CHAPTER IX 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN^T HAVE 

B urnet was pretty quiet when he got up the 
next morning, and Bill made no attempt to 
force conversation. He thought he under- 
stood, in a way, how Bunny felt. He also knew that 
there was only one thing either of them were think- 
ing about, and it was foolish to pretend they were not 
by trying to talk of something else. 

The night had not cleared things up especially 
for Burnet. His feelings had cooled a little, but in 
cooling they had hardened, which was not any pleas- 
anter. He tried at times to turn his thoughts in 
another direction, but there was no dodging that 
one bitter, humiliating fact : he had been fooled into 
friendship by some one who had played on his good 
nature and sympathy only to turn against him in this 
unaccountable way in the end. And added to the 
humiliation was the bewilderment. What had Nich- 
ols to gain by saddling him with such a thing? 
Cribbing was a serious thing in Tresham. A man 
who was caught at it was expelled in short order. 
201 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


What good would it do Nichols to have him ex- 
pelled? Had he been /harboring some secret grudge, 
and was this his wiy of wiping it out? This was 
not so hard to believe as it might have been, for 
Burnet remembered unpleasant things that had hap- 
pened in the Nichols-McCarthy episode early in the 
fall which, now that he thought of it, had never been 
explained away. 

The whole business was sickening anyway, and 
Burnet onlyhoped that Nichols would be persuaded 
to leave without any public rumpus, and that he 
would not see him again before he left. So Bunny 
did not go to chapel that morning. After breakfast 
he went to the house, resolved to stay away from 
the Dorms even, till he heard that Nichols was 
gone. 

There Butt found him an hour later. Butt 
looked very serious. 

“Well,” said Burnet shortly. “Will he go?” 

“ WeVe made a mistake. Bunny?” Butt said 
soberly. 

“What? Didn’t he do it?” 

Burnet’s face lighted eagerly, but the light died 
out again at Butt’s response. 

“ Oh, he did it, but ” He paused, looking 

at Burnet. “ We weren’t fair to him.” 

“ What does he say? ” 

“ I haven’t seen him. I couldn’t find him. 


202 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


Meredith told me about it. He stopped me after 
chapel — he’s the head of the Honor System Com- 
mittee, you know — and said that Nichols came 
around to him last night and confessed the whole 
business.” 

Burnet stared at him. 

“ Did he — did he say why he did it? ” 

“ Yes, and that’s the funny part of it. It seems 
that right after he found out that you were in this 
mess he went straight down to Morty and told 
him the whole thing, and he sent him around to 
Merry. Merry called me up on the ’phone to 
tell me about it, but it was before I got back from 
Bill’s.” 

“ Did he want to get me into trouble? ” 

“ No ! That’s where we weren’t fair to him. 
We jumped right at that, as if he couldn’t have been 
trying to do anything else. He was trying to help 
you!” 

“Help me!” 

“ He knew you were down in Math. He was 
’way down himself, too. He was the last one left 
in the room, and he saw what a fine chance it was to 
take some one else’s paper and fix his problems right, 
so he copied Hopper’s, and then he thought of you. 
He looked at your paper, and saw it was probably 
all wrong — it wasn’t like Hopper’s — so he changed 
yours, too. He had to do it in a hurry, so he didn’t 
203 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

have time to do It so carefully. He never thought 
it might be found out and get you Into trouble.” 

Burnet felt suddenly as if a great load had been 
lifted off him. He had not realized It, but his 
whole faith in friends and friendship had been ebb- 
ing away since this faithlessness of Nichols’s, and 
now it came back In a surging rush. 

“Poor Nick!” he exclaimed, his eyes shining. 

“ He’s a poor, deluded fool,” said Butt. “ The 
whole business was foolishness, and the only thing 
in his favor was his good intentions. But Pm afraid 
they won’t help him much.” 

“ Why, will they punish him, now that he’s con- 
fessed? ” 

“Why not? He cribbed, didn’t he? Cribbed 
for himself and cribbed for you. There’s no getting 
away from that.” 

There wasn’t, apparently, so far as Burnet was 
able to see, but later In the day, when the Committee 
had met again. Butt was not so discouraging. He 
could not tell what was going to be done ; he could 
not even tell what the recommendation of the Com- 
mittee had been, but the case was now out of their 
hands and up to the faculty, and there was a chance, 
a bare chance, that It might not come out so badly 
as they had feared. 

Burnet still rather dreaded seeing Nichols: It 
was hard to know what to say to him. But It turned 
204 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


out that Nichols was avoiding him, too, so Burnet 
went straight to Nichols’s room and got the interview 
over. It was not especially hard once they got to- 
gether, though Burnet found he could not be as frank 
as he had intended to be. He had meant to give 
Nichols a good talking to on the right and wrong 
things that could be done in the name of friendship, 
but he finally came away without doing anything of 
the kind, and considerably puzzled by the way Nich- 
ols evidently looked at such things. He seemed to be 
afflicted with a sort of moral blindness that made it 
hard to discuss this present matter with him accord- 
ing to ordinary standards. As far as the cribbing 
went, considered by itself, he could not see that it was 
wrong in his case — nor would it be in Burnet’s, ac- 
cording to him — because he was not trying for high 
marks. He was simply trying to get through, which, 
unlike high marks, did not raise him in rank above 
any of his fellow-students and brought him no false 
honors. As to this particular case of cribbing, that 
which he had done for Burnet was entirely justified 
by the motives that prompted it. He had done it to 
help a friend, and to him that made it all right. Ap- 
parently he could have, cheated, lied, anything, 
without a qualm of conscience, if he were only doing 
it to help some one for whom he cared. 

Just now Burnet did hot want to go into any 
very deep argument about these things. It would 
205 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


have to be conducted on too personal grounds, and 
it would involve talking about the way he and 
Nichols felt toward each other, and that Burnet 
shrank from. 

It was decided that nothing more would be done 
in the Nichols case until after the holiday vacation, 
now only two days off. It had peculiar features that 
needed careful consideration, and the faculty post- 
poned action till they should have time to deliberate 
more. So for the present none of the students knew 
about it except Burnet and Bill and the Committee. 

Bill spent a merry Christmas in the little town 
where Butt and Burnet lived, and two days later 
went to New York to meet his family, where the 
other two joined him on the afternoon of New Year’s 
Eve. 

To all three of them New Year’s Eve in New 
York was an entirely new experience. Welles, Butt’s 
former classmate, was to meet them directly after 
dinner and show them the sights, but at the last mo- 
ment he telephoned that he could not join them till 
ten o’clock, so they started out alone. 

Early as it was when they reached Broadway 
it was already jammed with a merry, jostling crowd 
that surged up and down, back and forth, in a slow- 
moving stream apparently without beginning or end 
and without any aim except to keep on surging. The 
three linked arms to keep from being separated and 
206 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


let themselves drift with the current, very happy for 
a time just to watch the crowd. It was like a gigantic 
picnic where everybody knew everybody else and 
was glad to see everybody else, and no place for a 
man who was not on the best of jolly good terms' 
with his fellow-men. The din was well-nigh deafen- 
ing — horns bellowing, shrill mouth-whistles screech- 
ing, cow-bells jangling — and beneath it all the in- 
cessant undercurrent of merry thousands talking 
and laughing. Confetti fairly rained, until the 
street ran with it under foot as with a stream, 
and when one was not dodging confetti, one 
was dodging the feather ticklers that almost every 
other merry-maker kept thrusting into his neighbor’s 
face. 

It was good fun, being one of that good-natured 
throng, and our three visitors from the country were 
content simply to drift along with it, each armed with 
a feather tickler he had snatched from some unwary 
passer-by, intoxicated by the crowd, the lights and 
the merry uproar. 

Suddenly Butt stopped and turned. 

“ There’s Effie Colchester! ” he exclaimed. 

“Where?” 

“ He just passed us — he and another fellow. 
Come on, let’s catch up with them,” and Butt tried 
to point them out. 

“ Move forward, please ! Plenty of room in 
207 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

the front of the carl ” piped a fat man behind 
them. 

“ We’re blocking traffic here,” said Bill. “ We’d 
better get out of the way.” 

“ Let’s turn around and catch up with them,” 
and Butt started forcing his way back. But they were 
in the part of the crowd that was moving forward, 
and they had to shove their way into a stream in the 
other direction before they could make much 
progress. By that time Colchester and his compan- 
ion were lost sight of, but the three kept on, trusting 
that luck would somehow bring them together again. 

It did: before they had gone a block they came 
upon Colchester and Meredith standing in front of a 
big doorway, buying wJiirligig rattlers from a lame 
Italian. 

“ Tresham this way!” called Butt, grabbing 
Colchester by the arm. Colchester turned. 

‘‘Butt Chanler!” he exclaimed. “Where in 
thunder did you drop from? ” 

“ From up in the rural districts. We’re seeing 
the big city. Aren’t you a long way from home ? ” 

“ We thought we’d give the metropolis a treat. 
Hello, you other people! What’s that you’ve got 
there? Ticklers! That’s plebeian. You’ve got 
to have some of these things if you want to travel in 
our circle. Here, Michael Angelo, we desire to 
purchase three more of these weapons ! ” 

208 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


The three cast away their ticklers and took 
the new noise-makers which the smiling Italian 
handed out to them with a “ Happa New Year, 
Signori.” 

“ Now whither bound? ” asked Colchester, giv- 
ing his rattler a deafening whirl. 

“ Nowhere in particular. We’re just roaming 
around till ten o’clock. We’re to meet Walter 
Welles then and have him show us the town.” 

“ Then we’ll roam together,” and Colchester led 
the way, elbowing his passage into the crowd. 

Meredith had not spoken a word to them. His 
greeting had been a bare nod. 

“ We’re butting into something here,” whispered 
Bill, putting his mouth close to Butt’s ear. 

“ Of course we’re not ! Can’t you see Effie’s 
glad to see us? He’d tell us if he didn’t want us 
along.” 

‘‘ That’s all right, but Meredith is sore about it. 
I move we let ’em go along by themselves.” 

“ Wait till we get uptown farther. We’ll meet 
Welles there, and if they want to duck away they 
can. I want to see Effie a minute.” 

So they kept on till they came to the hotel where 
they were to meet Welles. There Butt got Col- 
chester off into a corner for his “minute,” while the 
other three stood waiting, Meredith a little apart 
and obviously fidgeting. 


209 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


While they stood there Welles came up, and 
Meredith introduced him to Bill and Burnet. 

“ Glad to know you,” he said cordially. “ I 
really know you already, because Butt keeps me 
pretty well posted about the people up in college. 
He’s the only man I ever knew who writes regular 
letters that really tell things. Where is the little 
feller? ” 

“ Over there in the corner talking secrets with 
Colchester. Here, Butt!” 

Butt’s attention was at length attracted and there 
followed a period of greetings and questionings and 
answerings during which Meredith and Colchester 
disappeared. 

“ I’m glad they’re gone,” remarked Bill. “ That 
man Meredith is about as good company as a deaf 
and dumb man. I’d like to know what Effie travels 
around with him for.” 

“ There’s a reason 1 ” said Butt meaningly, 
speaking aside so that Burnet would not hear. “ I’ll 
tell you later, but it’s a dead, dead secret.” 

Sabrina I It came to Bill in a flash, but he only 
said: 

“ Well, Meredith needn’t think I’m after any 
of his secrets. Do you suppose if we went out on 
the street again he’d think we were trying to follow 
him?” 

“ Let’s go where we can sit down and talk for a 


210 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


while. We’ve tramped around enough for now, and 
we can go out again when it comes time to see the 
New Year in.” 

Welles knew a place where they could sit down 
and talk, and thither they repaired and there they 
stayed till nearly midnight. There was much 
to talk of, and Butt evidently imparted his dead, 
dead secret to Welles under cover of the music and 
uproar of the cafe where they sought refreshment, 
while Bill, suspecting the subject of the revelations 
that were going on, kept Burnet’s attention in other 
directions. 

The secret might have been unfolded under Bur- 
net’s very nose, though, without his suspecting it, 
for he was busy making mental notes of what was 
going on about him. Everything was grist to his 
mill, and even as he sat there he planned out a 
wonderful story that he could put it all into. He 
was trying his hand at real stories nowadays, not 
Sabrina themes, and here was new local color galore. 

“ Come on,” said Welles finally. “ The street’s 
the place to see the New Year in — up on Times 
Square,” and out he led them. The crowd was 
bigger and merrier than ever, and the jam about 
Times Square almost impassable. But they found 
a place on the edge of the sidewalk where they took 
their stand, arms about each other’s shoulders to 
brace them against the pressure from behind, to 


21 1 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


watch the electric ball high above the Times Build- 
ing. At midnight that ball would drop. 

The crowd had stopped moving now. It stood 
still, dense and compact, every eye turned upward. 
It was silent, too, breathlessly waiting. There 
seemed something hypnotic about that ball of light, 
holding those thousands of eyes during that strange 
hush. Our four unconsciously stretched upward till 
they stood on tiptoes, their faces raised. Then 
somewhere the first stroke of a church bell tolled, 
and pandemonium broke loose as the ball dropped. 
And with it, as one man, dropped the four, as if 
something that had held them up suddenly let 
go, and they lay in a laughing heap on the side- 
walk. 

“Happy New Year I Happy New Year!” 
Everybody was greeting everybody, and they picked 
themselves up, helped by friendly strangers, to shake 
hands with whoever happened to be nearest. 

“It’s lucky no one we know saw us,” laughed 
Bill. “ They’d think we’d had too much New 
Year.” 

“Where do you want to go now?” asked 
Welles, as they stopped where a large doorway made 
an eddy in the stream of moving people. 

“ Let’s not see any more sights to-night — unless 
you really want to,” suggested Bill. “ Is there any- 
thing more to see? ” 


212 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


“ Just more of the same kind of thing — and 
then some more,” said Welles. 

“ Let’s go back to the hotel, then. We can sit 
around there and talk. I’d rather, if you’re game.” 

They were, for it had been a long day and the 
night promised to be even longer before it was 
done. To judge from the streets the town might 
just have been starting in. So they started back to 
Bill’s hotel. On the way Bill discovered a new 
pastime for their amusement — which consisted sim- 
ply in flipping a handkerchief at some passer-by. 
The flipped one invariably turned indignantly 
around, feeling in his pocket with one hand and 
snatching at the handkerchief with the other, under 
the momentary delusion that he was being pick- 
pocketed. This made diversion enough for them 
till they reached the cross street where Mr. Bill had 
made their headquarters. They found the rest of 
the Bill family had not yet come in, so they repaired 
to the smoking room for what Welles called a “ gab- 
fest.” 

There was plenty to talk about. Welles had to 
hear all about the college, and Butt had to hear all 
about Welles and his doings out in the “ wide, 
wide world.” Burnet listened eagerly, convinced 
that the life of a New York reporter was the life for 
him — at least until he had written his famous book, 
then he would have no need for a job of any kind. 

15 213 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


But the freshman’s head at length had all it could 
stand of new things, and he fell asleep in his chair, 
while the others, with lowered voices, talked of the 
“ dead, dead secret.” 

Bill had already partly guessed what it was — the 
Sabrina banquet was to be held here in New York 
within a fortnight. That was why Meredith was in 
town, and one of the reasons Butt had found it con- 
venient to accept Bill’s holiday invitation. He had 
been coming to New York anyway, and to-morrow 
Burnet must be kept engaged while he hied himself 
off to aid in completing arrangements that were neces- 
sary. 

“ It’s been more fun, Walter,” whispered Butt, 
giggling happily. “ A little while ago Bill suddenly 
got interested in Sabrina, and kept talking and ask- 
'•ing about her, and I had a great time all to myself 
kidding him about the great secret that was brewing. 
That is, every one thought I was kidding, but this 
thing was being planned all the time.” 

Bill wished that Welles knew all that had 
really happened. He wanted very much to wink at 
some one over Butt’s head. But Welles did not 
know, and the wink would not have been under- 
stood. 

“ What has Effie got to do with it? ” he asked. 

“ Nothing, only he happens to be here with 
Merry just as you happen to be here with me. Of 
214 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


course he knows about it, but except the committee 
and you two, he and Merry are the only ones.” 

“ Isn’t there any one else? ” asked Bill slyly. 

“ Oh, of course the one — the one that has charge 
of her now. But no one knows who that is but 
Merry.” 

“ Not even the president of the sophomore 
class? ” 

“ When they get ready to tell me they will,” 
said Butt with dignity. “ I haven’t asked, I know 
that.” 

And then Bill did wink. But Welles only half 
understood what the joke was, though he smiled 
responsively. 

There was a lot more planning about the various 
things the class would do in connection with the 
banquet in the way of having a good time, and much 
pledging of secrecy, and at length they aroused Bur- 
net and bade Welles good night. 

“ You can get around to-morrow some time, 
can’t you? ” Butt asked, as Welles stood in the door 
to go. “ We have to leave some time in the after- 
noon.” 

“ I think so. I’ll call you up, anyway. So 
long.” 

Bill helped Butt to make excuses the next morn- 
ing and kept Burnet from being curious by a sly 
mention of a “ friend ” Butt had to see. Burnet was 
215 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


too busy gathering new impressions, h j^ever, to be 
curious about Butt, and Bill need not have perjured 
himscT even by implication. 

T>iat night they were back in Tresham, and 
Butt confided to Bill most privately that all was 
arranged, but he mustn’t breathe a word to anybody 
or even let on that he knew there was anything to 
breathe a word about. 

College brought Nichols again, and Burnet 
sighed at the thought of seeing him once more. 
Things were so petty here in Tresham. If he were 
only out in the world, doing things among grown 
men as Welles was ! He indulged in a little period 
of discontent, in which he decided that he was wast- 
ing his time here, and would quit college and go to 
work at the end of the year — a period which most 
fellows pass through some time before they get to 
be juniors; it seems to be part of the college course. 

Nichols was apparently untroubled by any anx- 
iety about how his affairs were coming out, and in 
the face of his serenity it seemed useless for any- 
one else to worry. But the days passed and no 
thunderbolt fell, until those who were waiting began 
almost to believe that nothing was to happen after 
all. 

Besides, Butt had the banquet to think of, and 
he moved about in a state of excitement that amused 
Bill tremendously. But it was admirably concealed, 
216 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


and Bill \vOi;i(’fred if he could have detected it if he 
had not happened to know what a deal of plotting 
and secret-keeping was going on in the head of the 
small sophomore president. 

Bill, since he did happen to know, was con- 
tinually informed of the progress of things, though 
the information was always imparted behind locked 
doors or far afield where any eavesdropper within 
half a mile could be quickly sighted. But one part 
of the secret even Bill could not know yet, though 
Butt was not able to refrain from telling him that 
there was such a part. He chuckled over it mightily, 
hinting that it was the best joke ever, and at length 
admitting that it had to do with the man who was 
Sabrina’s guardian. 

“ You could guess and guess and guess, and 
you’d never hit it,” he confided. “ But there’s no 
use in guessing, because I can’t tell you even if you 
do get it right.” So Bill did not try to guess. But 
he, too, chuckled. 

He got additional fun out of watching Colches- 
ter, too. He did it quietly, however, and in a dif- 
ferent spirit from that which had formerly possessed 
him. He was done with the old-time spying. He 
kept watch now just for amusement, and to see if 
Effie would notice it. Apparently Effie had quite 
forgotten that Bill had once been very near to tread- 
ing on forbidden ground, and he gave no sign of 
217 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


suspecting that he was the object of a friendly 
“ shadow.’' 

As a matter of fact Bill saw nothing at all out of 
the ordinary. If Colchester were as full of what 
was impending as Butt, he concealed it perfectly, 
and Bill had to admit that as a plotter the easy-going 
senior was a complete success. He discovered noth- 
ing at all, until one day he found that Effie had left 
town, quietly and naturally, as was his wont in all 
things, and without exciting question. Bill chuckled 
again, and still again when Butt drew him into his 
bedroom to tell him there was not much longer to 
wait. 

The great day was really near. All arrange- 
ments were complete, the taxes on each member of 
the class had been levied, the loyal followers of the 
goddess were prepared, and only the time for de- 
parture remained to be disclosed. That, and the 
place to which they were going, was still kept secret. 

Butt was to leave a day in advance, and he con- 
fided to Bill that that day would probably be the 
morrow. 

“ If it weren’t for Goat I’d go to-day. Perhaps 
I can sneak off after Goat to-night.” 

‘‘ Goat,” so-called at Tresham, is the weekly 
fraternity meeting, and obviously Butt could not be 
absent from that without exciting inquiries from 
juniors and freshmen, so wait he must. 

2l8 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


That afternoon the faculty came to a decision 
in the Nichols case, though only the Honor System 
Committee was informed of it. What public an- 
nouncement needed to be made would be made 
to-morrow. It was a singularly lenient decision, 
arrived at after much earnest deliberation, for the 
case had peculiar features. Nichols was merely to be 
flunked in Mathematics, which, to him, brought with 
it the penalty of dropping back into the freshman 
class. His standing as a sophomore was too pre- 
carious to bear the additional burden of an unequivo- 
cal, out-and-out condition. 

Butt told Bill about this, too. 

“ They had Nichols around and gave him a 
talking to this afternoon,” he said. “ Do you know. 
Bill, that man has horseshoes all over him, and he 
doesn’t know it. When I told him he was lucky to 
get off as easy as he did, he just grinned that grin of 
his. He thinks they couldn’t have done anything 
more.” 

“ I should think it was enough. I’d hate to tell 
my old man I’d been put back into the freshman 
class.” 

“ Well, Nick is different. He’d have been there 
anyway by the end of the semester. He was only a 
sophomore by the skin of his teeth. The queer part 
of it is that he doesn’t see any disgrace in it, and 
that’s just what they wanted him to see. The pun- 
219 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


ishment doesn’t amount to anything in his case — 
they made that part light because they have a notion 
he must have some good to him to have done it for 
Bunny the way he did; and then they tried to talk 
ideals to him. But ideals aren’t in Herbie’s line, I’m 
afraid.” 

“ Well, Bunny’ll have him for a classmate now. 
That’s a blessing he’ll appreciate.” 

“Bill!” Butt spoke very seriously. “I want 
to know what you think. Of course none of the ban- 
quet committee has known anything about this thing. 
We didn’t know ourselves that Nick would be put 
out of our class, and they’ve got his money for the 
banquet.” 

“ Why shouldn’t they? ” 

“ They should, of course. But he isn’t in our 
class any more. Do you think he ought to go to the 
banquet? ” 

“ I don’t see why not. He’s paid his money and 
he’s a Sabrina man. Once a Sabrina man, always a 
Sabrina man, isn’t it? It ought to be if it isn’t.” 

Butt’s anxious seriousness relaxed. 

“ That’s what I thought, but people don’t always 
agree with me about such things. Anyway, I’ve fixed 
it so he’ll be able to go all right. He’ll get word 
when the others do, and he can go if he wants to.” 

“ I don’t think anybody’ll kick. When does the 
sentence go into effect? ” 


220 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


“ They’re going to announce it in chapel to- 
morrow. They think the whole force of the punish- 
ment will be lost if people don’t know about it. But I 
think Nick is more pleased than anything else. He’s 
glad to be in Bunny’s class ! ” 

‘‘ Well, he’s a queer one, that’s all I can say for 
him. I’d rather be in my own shoes than Bunny’s. 
I’m not especially strong for that kind of devotion.” 

That was the last Bill saw of Butt alone before 
he left town. He managed to steal away unchal- 
lenged after Goat,” and the sophomores, who were 
the only ones who noticed his absence, sighed, each 
to himself, with relief. They remembered a time, 
little more than a year ago, when their president had 
not escaped so successfully. 

Chapel-goers had something new to talk about 
the next morning, when the fact of Nichols’s crib- 
bing, with certain details that were deemed necessary 
in explanation of its punishment, was made public 
for the first time. Burnet, who knew what was com- 
ing, cut chapel, but Nichols was there as usual, pre- 
senting a front that many called brazen and some 
called brave. It was probably more indifferent than 
anything else. 

And the chapel-goers talked about it, with con- 
siderable difference of opinion. For the first time in 
his college career, Nichols might have heard good 
words said about himself if he had been around to 


221 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


hear. Something in what he had done won sym- 
pathy, as the down-trodden ruffian who strikes a 
blow for the one man who has done him a kindness 
sometimes wins our sympathy in story books. Most 
of the fellows agreed that he had been foolish, but 
to many of them that did not make any difference 
with the spirit in which he had acted, and they con- 
tended that he should not have been punished at all. 
The majority thought that the faculty had done 
wisely and justly by him, while some — those who 
had called him brazen — maintained heatedly that 
he had no more right to a light sentence than any 
other who might have been caught in cheating. He 
had cheated for himself before he had cheated for 
Burnet. 

But Nichols heard none of this, nor would he 
have been greatly interested if he had. He was 
quite content with the way things had turned out. 
He had not enjoyed being a sophomore anyway, and 
perhaps now he could make a place for himself in 
the class with the one fellow who had been friendly 
to him without making him feel that being so was a 
favor. He was going to make an attempt at it, at 
any rate. 

Early in the afternoon the sophomores were 
given something besides Nichols to think of. Word 
was passed around, with a secrecy for which Butt 
could have found nothing but praise, that all Sabrina 
222 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


men who could go were to leave in the early even- 
ing for New York. It was a word that they had 
been expecting for many days, but it was not any less 
exciting for that. Then they showed what a year in 
college had done for them, for though this was one 
of the most momentous occasions of its kind that was 
to come to them, they went about their business with 
a nonchalance that had been utterly impossible when 
their freshman banquet was coming off. They laid 
their plans coolly, right in the face of unsuspecting 
odd-classmen, and when the time came for them to 
leave, lo ! they were gone. 

As in all things which they did, the Kappa Chi 
sophomores prepared for this departure together, ac- 
cording to plans that seemed hardly worth all the 
earnest discussion they gave them. It was decided 
that this was no time for stealthy sneaking away, as if 
they had no right to go. That was well enough when 
they were freshmen — it even added a certain spice of 
adventure. But now, if ever, they ought to be able 
to depart openly, with only their wits and their care- 
less bearing to carry them through without exciting 
question. All the more glory to them if they could 
come back and say : “ Well, you saw us go : we made 
no secret of it. If you had been wise you could have 
nabbed us then and there.” 

It was no unsual thing for the sophomore dele- 
gation to run over to Southboro for an evening, and 
223 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


that was what they were apparently going to do to- 
night. Bill met the others at the house after supper, 
ready to start. To add to their daring, they even 
paid visits to all the rooms, to crow secretly over 
their less fortunate odd-class brethren. As it hap- 
pened, however, the house was empty save for some 
seniors, who had been to one Sabrina banquet and 
for financial reasons felt they could forego the joys 
of another. 

“ Give our regards to the lady,’’ they said, “ and 
see that Effie Colchester gets back safe. He’s likely 
to get lost in that little New York town.” 

And so they left, without an enemy in sight. 

“ This looks too easy,” said Bill as they boarded 
the Southboro car at the corner. 

“ I’m glad it is,” said Hawkins, breathing an 
audible sigh of relief. He was not a good actor, and 
he was quite satisfied not to have had to play the 
part so bravely laid out for them. “ This bold and 
daring game is all very well, but I’m glad we’re 
safely off.” 

At Southboro they took the train for Springfield, 
and many other sophomores were aboard, with a 
small sprinkling of seniors. They felt well out of 
the woods now, and the festive spirit that was to 
culminate in the banquet began to awaken. The 
quartet from Kappa Chi had stopped at the station 
to dispatch a telegram to Butt saying all was well, 
224 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


and nothing remained between them and the shrine 
of their devotion but four hours’ train ride. 

Still more sophomores awaited them in Spring- 
field, so that now the loyal followers of Sabrina num- 
bered over a hundred strong. They made an impos- 
ing throng as they stood on the station platform 
chanting their 

“All hail, Sabrina, dear!” 

The spirit of it was growing on Bill. 

“ It’s too bad Bunny isn’t one of us,” he told 
Gray. “ He’s always lamenting how nobody ever 
raves over Sabrina any more. He just ought to be 
along now and see I Say — Let’s send him a mes- 
sage of condolence — it’ll make him all the sorrier 
he’s nothing but a freshman, and we’re far enough 
away now so it won’t do any harm.” 

So the four of them went to send another tele- 
gram. They made it so lengthy that the operator, 
who was new to his job and inclined to take a per- 
sonal interest in the messages passing through his 
hands, stared at it with open curiosity. 

“ Excuse me,” he said, as he counted the num- 
ber of words. “ But you’re college students, ain’t 
you?” 

Hawkins, who felt that this was undue familiar- 
ity and therefore to be resented, drew himself up 
to his full height and scowled. 

225 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“What’s that to you?” he demanded in his 
gruffest voice. 

The operator retreated a step. 

“ Well, you needn’t get mad. I thought this was 
probably a joke.” 

“ What’s that to you? ” repeated Hawkins. 

The operator’s face was red now, and his voice 
dropped its friendly tone. 

“ Nothing at all if you’re going to take it that 
way. I thought if it was a joke, I could put you wise 
to something so’s it wouldn’t turn out to be on you. 
But I’ll let you run your own affairs.” 

“What do you mean?” asked Bill, shoving 
Hawkins out of the way ^d nudging him to keep 
still. 

“ Nothing at all, nothing at all,” said the opera- 
tor, resuming his counting of the words. “ Excuse 
me for buttin’ in.” 

Bill became straightway very pacific. 

“Who said you were butting in? It is a joke, 
and if there’s anything that can help it along I 
wish you’d tell us. We’re sorry we got huffy 
about it.” 

Bill’s manner, fully as much as his words, suc- 
ceeded in mollifying the offended operator. 

“ Well, I thought it was sort of a shame to send 
a great long thing like this to a feller when he ain’t 
there to get it.” 


226 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 

“ What do you mean? ” Bill asked again sharply, 
and Hawkins pressed forward again, fixing the 
operator with his scowl, until he squirmed uneasily. 

Nothin’, only there was a feller by the name 
of Theodore E. Burnet sent a message here not 
more than twenty minutes ago. It may not be the 
same one, but the name was the same.” 

“ What did he say? ” demanded Hawkins. 

“ Oh, I can’t tell that. But he isn’t in Tresham, 
and he won’t be to-night.” 

The four looked at one another. 

“ Come on,” said Bill. “ Thank you,” he added 
to the operator, laying down a coin for him. ‘‘ You 
needn’t send the message.” 

“Well, what do you know about that?” re- 
marked Durham, who had been a silent onlooker to 
what was going on. 

“ I don’t know anything — ^but I’d like to know.” 
Bill relapsed into thought. 

Out on the platform the fellows were still sing- 
ing, to the plain enjoyment of a small crowd that was 
also waiting for a train. The train was almost due 
now. Already the train announcer was heralding its 
approach, and as its light gleamed far up the track 
they all massed together to give the long Tresham 
yell, with a resounding “ Sabrina! Sabrina! Sa- 
brina! on the end of it. 

Suddenly there came an answering yell that 
227 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


turned the cheering into pandemonium, and, com- 
ing from everywhere. It seemed, there appeared 
countless swiftly moving figures who mingled, shout- 
ing, with the waiting crowd just as the train 
pulled In. 

Bill felt his arm clutched from behind, and turned 
to look Into the grinning face of Bobby Crane, 
Noughty-Odd. 

“ Stung! ” remarked Crane blithely. 

Bill tried to snatch away. 

“What’s the use of scrapping?” asked the ju- 
nior. “ There are as many of us here as there are of 
you. They’re not going to hold the train here while 
we fight It out, and you people aren’t going to get 
aboard without a fight.” 

Bill did not stop to dispute with him, for the 
fight was on. All up and down the platform It raged, 
while the tralnsmen swore and respectable citizens 
appealed to the law to open them a passage to the 
waiting cars. The law was represented by only three 
policemen who chanced to be opportunely near, but 
they were of brawny build and armed with stout 
billies, and they managed to clear a space around 
the car steps. At length the train pulled out, 
but the fight continued, until more policemen ar- 
rived and quelled it through sheer power of hard 
hitting. 

The combatants were some time in becoming 
228 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


quiet, and the blue-coated guardians of the peace 
were still kept busy putting down individual fracases, 
with many threats of arrest if the fighting was not 
stopped. Bill, with collar torn off and hat gone, led 
a small band of dishevelled ones to the station wash- 
room, where he found Burnet nursing a bleeding 
nose. 

“ How’s this for the good old times. Bunny? ” he 
asked with an attempt to smile, that discovered to 
him a swollen upper lip. 

Burnet was too occupied to answer, and besides. 
Crane, who had perched on the edge of the wash- 
basin, preempted everybody’s attention with his 
crowing. 

“ The good old times are back again, and Sabrina 
is safe in the hands of her rightful owners once 
more,” he announced gaily. 

The sullen sophomores would not give him any 
satisfaction by asking questions, but Crane was not 
deterred by that. He went on to give details freely 
and generously. 

“ After long years the stolen goddess is restored. 
To-morrow there will be tearing and gnashing in 
New York town, for you who are expected will 
not arrive and then the great loss will be dis- 
covered.” 

“ Will you vacate a few inches and give me a 
chance at this washbowl?” interrupted Hawkins, 
229 


16 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


brushing Crane from his perch with an arm that 
was not wholly gentle. 

“ Don’t be so peevish about it,” retorted Crane 
mildly. “ There’s no use railing against fate, you 
know; and fate decreed long ago that your eyes a 
would never rest on the fair Sabrina.” 

Bill turned and fled from this gloating junior. ; 
He had never found Crane tiresome before, but to- r 
night he seemed absolutely banal. 

Bill was no unhappier than the rest of his class- 
mates. The first fighting spirit had died down, but i. 
the humiliation of defeat smouldered and gathered 
heat, and it was a sullen crowd that waited for the r 
last train back to Southboro. For New York and ■■ 
the banquet was out of the question now; noth- 
ing was left but the dismal return to Tresham, ' 
there to meet afresh the taunts and jibes of the odd- : 
classmen. ■> 

How it had happened was a mystery. The i 
sophomores were still too sore in spirit to talk calmly # 
with their rivals about the matter, and the others, % 
taking their cue from Crane, insisted that it was just f 
fate. Sabrina was weary of captivity, and had re- j 
turned to the class of her choice without human 
agency. , 

All of which was nonsense, as Bill knew very j 
well. But he was not able to figure out anything ^ 
satisfactory in place of it. This sudden descent ofi 
230 ^ 


THE BANQUET THEY DIDN’T HAVE 


odd-classmen upon them could not have been planned 
very long in advance. There had not been long to 
plan it in, and someone would surely have got wind of 
it. They had probably learned about the coming ban- 
quet when the final instructions were passed around 
that afternoon. Anyway, Sabrina must still be safe, 
for she was not to be brought forth till the next day, 
and the cleverest maneuvering that freshmen and 
juniors were capable of could not get on her track 
till then. 

Crane’s talk was probably all hot air, with only 
the fact that their departure had been discovered and 
prevented for a basis. 

So Bill sent another telegram to Butt : 

Noughty-Odd has detained entire class in Springfield. Use- 
less to try to come. They know where we are going. Be 
careful.** 

Butt would have to make what he could out of 
that, and be on his guard. There might be some of 
the enemy in New York, but being forewarned. Butt 
and Meredith ought not to find it hard to dodge 
them. 

It was not a gay crowd that made extra cars 
necessary to get back to Tresham from Southboro 
that night. Even the anti-Sabrinaites had worn 
themselves weary with gloating, though they man- 
231 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


aged to muster up some fitful yelling when they 
finally separated to go to bed. But the loyal wor- 
shipers of the “ Widow ” let them yell undisturbed. 
All their spirit was gone. 

And Nichols — Freshman Nichols, now — was to 
blame. 


CHAPTER X 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 

N ichols could no longer complain that he 
was not a figure of some prominence in the 
life of Tresham College — if he had ever 
felt moved to make such a complaint. On Wednesday 
morning a chapel announcement had brought him out 
of obscurity and made him talked about, but that was 
as nothing to the whirlwind raised by what became 
known on Thursday. He was the man who had be- 
trayed the secret of the Sabrina banquet ! 

Various people had sympathized with him in 
the matter of his cribbing, and hardly anyone had 
condemned him as being anything worse than fool- 
ish. But now he was an outcast, ostracized, for he 
was the blackest kind of a traitor. 

Poor Nichols ! It was his trump card, which he 
had played for the highest stake he knew — to be 
looked on as a loyal and true member of the new 
class into which he had been thrust. It had not 
been deliberate; it had come to him as a sort of 
inspiration, which he had hugged to himself as a 

233 . 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


sign from Heaven, pointing the way to trust and 
honor. Everything seemed to help him. Chanler 
had taken particular pains to inform him of where 
the banquet was to be, and the committee had sought 
him out and told him when they were to leave just 
as if he had still been a regular sophomore. But he I 
wasn’t still a sophomore, which let him out according 
to his way of thinking, and he was glad he wasn’t. 
.Anyone else with the information he had would be 
V justified in revealing it — so was he I 

Some instinct warned him, however, that Bur- 
net was not the man to tell. Instead, he went to 
Rowson, and the deed was done. No one stopped to 
examine the source of the information. For the 
present the joyous excitement of having it was 
enough, especially as it was very easily verified by 
watching the sly maneuvers of the sophomores. 
The juniors immediately assumed the leadership; 
a half dozen of them straightway left for New York, 
on the chance of taking the guardians by surprise 
with the statue in their possession, and the rest, 
reinforced by many freshmen, slipped quietly away 
to Springfield to surprise, the banqueters in the first 
flush of their jubilation. 

It worked, and the plans of the sophomores were 
effectually spoiled, l^was good fun into the bargain, 
and Burnet rejoiced in the return of the old-time 
spirit. In his enthusiasm he had sent a long telegram 

234 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


to an odd-class alumnus he knew in New York, who 
was still young enough to enjoy going out on the 
trail of Sabrina, telling him where the banquet was 
to be held and bidding him get on the job. 

But the next morning, when the excitement had 
somewhat abated, people began to ask how the thing 
had been discovered. The particulars became known 
in short order, and straightway Nichols became tre- 
mendously unpopular. ‘‘ Once a Sabrina man, al- 
ways a Sabrina man ” turned out to be a pretty 
general sentiment in the odd as well as the even 
classes, and there was hardly a fellow that did not 
condemn Nichols’s action. It wasn’t playing fair, 
it was bidding for popularity at the cost of honor and 
decency and everything else, and even Burnet turned 
against him. 

“ How could you do it? ” he demanded disgust- 
edly. “ Butt trusted you. He went out of his 
way to fix things so you could go, because he was 
sorry for you. It was your last chance: your last 
chance was even gone, but he gave it back to you 
when you had been kicked out of his class ! ” 

“ What did I care about their old banquet and 
their old statue? He didn’t need to tell me about it. 
I never asked him to,” protested Nichols, bewildered 
and hurt by the storm that had burst about him. 

If you’d got wind of it you’d have told. Any of 
you wofild.” 


235 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Not if I’d been in your place. We want to ! 
get that statue, but we’d be sports about it. We i 
wouldn’t have betrayed any trust like that.” I 

“ I’m a freshman, and I did it for my class.” | 

“ There’s no use talking about it,” said Burnet | 
shortly, and he would talk no more. | 

Altogether, Nichols was “ in ” decidedly wrong. | 
He was misunderstood on every hand, and turn f 
where he might he could find no sympathy that was I 
worth the having. All the friendly feeling and good- 
will he had got with so much difficulty was dashed 
away in one swoop, and, most heart-breaking of 
all, Burnet would have no more to do with him. yj 
Beside that, even the things that Chanler said to 
him did not matter, and Butt came to him in a 
white heat of rage and gave him such a tongue- 8 
lashing as he had never heard before. Butt did M 
not often get angry, but this betrayal of confidence f| 
stirred him to the depths and tipped his tongue with 
a stinging eloquence that ought to have left Nichols m 
scorched and done for. 1 

Butt was pretty well broken up over the turn S 
things had taken. Not only had the banquet been a | 
fizzle, which was shame enough in itself, but he came » 
in for a small share of criticism for trusting such a i 
man as Nichols, knowing all the particijjars as he S 
had. That did not last long, for most of the fellows | 
soon came to understand the spirit in which he had |[ 
,236 I 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


done it, but the fact remained that he had made a 
mistake, and that was a hurt to his self-esteem he 
could not quickly forget. 

After all, aside from the fact that the banquet 
had to be postponed and all the pjans made again, 
the harm done was not serious. The juniors who 
had hastened so confidently to New York, as well as 
the alumnus to whom Burnet had sent his urgent 
telegram, had failed absolutely to find any trace of 
Sabrina’s whereabouts. She was as safe as ever, 
apparently, and the odd-classmen were no nearer to 
getting her than they had been before. 

But interest in the bronze goddess had been 
effectually stimulated. She was more talked about 
than she had been for years, and Burnet had hopes 
that the old spirit had returned really to stay. The 
Sabrina war chant was sung and hooted at with a 
vim that was very far from perfunctory, and that 
rumpus on the platform of the Springfield station 
had provided a taste of battle that sharpened the ap- 
petite for more. The odd-classmen had successfully 
frustrated an attempt at a banquet — something that 
had not been done for so long that no one remem- 
bered its like — and that made them feel that per- 
haps it wasn’t such a hopeless struggle after all. 
If only they were given half a chance the real, 
ancient rivalry might be worth reviving again. 

The Sabrina men had to endure many taunts 

237 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


about the banquet they didn’t have, but that was not 
the end of the taunting. Challenges began to be 
issued to bring the goddess into reachable territory 
— to hold the banquet somewhere where distance 
was not the only thing to protect them, where to 
pull it off successfully would mean a real triumph of 
cleverness. 

Bill allied himself with this campaign, for he 
agreed thoroughly with Burnet that there was no 
credit in keeping the statue locked up in a safe- 
deposit vault and having the banquet in a place so 
far away that pursuit was out of the question. He 
argued the matter with Butt and other sophomores, 
but while some of them admitted that he was quite 
right, theoretically, they were all inclined to agree 
that safety was more to be desired than any amount 
of “ old-time spirit.” 

“ Just imagine that you had charge of her,” said 
Butt. “ You’d give up those ideas in a minute. It’s 
all right to talk, but if you were responsible for her 
you’d see that she was in the very safest place you 
could find. If a safe-deposit vault seemed the best 
place, you’d put her there.” 

“ No, sir! ” protested Bill. “Why, that takes 
every particle of sport away from it 1 It’s just like 
playing with loaded dice — you can’t lose, and what’s 
the fun when the other fellow hasn’t even a smell of 
a chance? ” 


238 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


‘‘ I don’t know. I never played with dice.” 

Bill snorted. 

“ That’s no argument. You know what I 
mean.” 

“ Of course I do. But I know what I mean, 
too. Think if she got away from you I You’d never 
hear the last of it, and it wouldn’t be any joke either. 
Every Sabrina man in the country would be jumping 
on you. You’d never live it down.” 

“Shucks! Do you suppose any Sabrina man 
thinks seriously about it one way or the other after 
he gets out of college? He might think the man 
that lost her wasn’t on to his job, but what would he 
care? ” 

“ You don’t know what Sabrina spirit is,” re- 
plied Butt shortly. 

“ Now look here. Butt! That sort of talk is all 
right sometimes, but just tell me honestly and seri- 
ously, do you think Sabrina amounts to anything 
really? This hot air about spirit and that sort of 
thing sounds well, but does it really mean anything? 
The whole business is a good custom. If I were a 
kid and heard about it I think I’d come to Tresham 
just because they have it here. But I’m a Sabrina 
man just as much as you are, and if there’s anything 
in it besides an excuse for a friendly scrap and a 
good banquet, I haven’t found it out yet.” 

“ I told you you didn’t know what Sabrina spirit 

239 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

was,” Butt repeated. Bill threw back his head im- 
patiently. 

“ There isn’t any — that’s the trouble,” he cried. 
“ And there would be if you weren’t so blamed 
scared about nothing. I tell you if I had charge of 
her I’d hide her right here in this town, and after 
I’d handed her over to the next man I’d tell about it, 
and show ’em what a lot of dummies they’d been not 
to get on to it.” 

Butt smiled, a very superior smile. 

“ That would sound mighty well, if you could 
do it. But I know you wouldn’t dare, when it came 
right down to it. The way they do now is the only 
safe way.” 

Bill tightened up his eyes into a quizzical look. 

“ Do you know where Sabrina has been hidden 
this year?” he asked. 

‘‘ No.” 

“ What if I told you that I did know ? ” 

“ I wouldn’t believe you.” 

‘‘ Well, I won’t tell you that. But I’ll tell you 
something else. I know who had her hidden.” 

Butt smiled again, unbelievingly. 

“Who?” 

“ EfEe Colchester.” 

Butt stared. 

“ Who told you? ” he demanded. 

It was Bill’s turn to smile now. 


240 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


No one.” 

“ How do you know, then? ” 

“ I just happened to find out.” 

“ Does anybody else know? ” 

“ I haven’t told anybody, if that’s what you 
mean. I suppose Meredith knows. I don’t know 
of anybody else.” 

“ But how did you find out? ” 

“ Oh, I have ways,” answered Bill mysteriously. 

Butt looked thoroughly uncomfortable. 

“You shouldn’t have done that. Bill!” he ex- 
claimed earnestly. “ It isn’t a joke, and it isn’t any 
of your business.” 

“ Oh, I know that, but I couldn’t help it. I’m 
not to blame for having ears and eyes.” 

“ What did I tell you? ” demanded Butt. “ That 
proves your theory about having her right around 
here is no good. If she were here in Tresham 
you’d have found out even where she was. Perhaps 
you do know? ” he added, suspiciously. 

“ No, I don’t know.” 

“ But someone else might, if they’d found out 
as much as you have. Don’t you see it’s no game ? ” 

“ I don’t think anyone else would be likely to 
find out what I did. I just happened upon it, any- 
way, and I had chances that a fellow who wasn’t a 
Sabrina man wouldn’t have had.” 

“ Won’t you tell me about it? ” 

241 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ There isn’t anything to tell especially. I 
saw Effie with Meredith two or three times, in sort 
of secret conference, and you know Effie and 
Meredith aren’t very great chums. I just put two 
and two together and guessed the answer, and then, 
when I came across another two, I added that on. 
Meredith and Effie were in New York together 
Christmas, and you yourself told me there was some- 
thing doing then, and then Effie left here for the 
banquet early. It made a pretty good chain of evi- 
dence, taking everything.” 

Bill was not yet ready to tell the tale of the 
empty box in Colchester’s barn. That was an inci- 
dent which other people might see as a good joke, 
but the experience was too recent to be a laughing 
matter with him. 

“ Well,” was Butt’s final comment, “ it all goes 
to show that I’m right and you’re wrong,” so both 
remained unconvinced. 

Bill was so unconvinced, in fact, that he joined 
forces with Burnet in ridiculing the attitude of the 
sophomores. The result of their combined efforts 
appeared one morning tacked to one of the pillars in 
front of the chapel — a huge poster whose drawing 
was very crude but whose meaning was perfectly 
plain. It represented an hilarious feast, with a piti- 
ful caricature of Sabrina adorning the center of the 
table, held in a sort of fortress, protected on all 
242 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


sides by huge cannon. Militia patrolled the street 
outside and at each door stood a phalanx of gigantic 
policemen. Beneath it was printed in sprawling 
capitals: “None but the brave deserve the fair.” 

This masterpiece did not stay on view for long. 
After a five-minute tussle some sophomores suc- 
ceeded in tearing it down. But it served as the be- 
ginning of other things of the same kind, and for a 
time the Noughty-Even men made a regular tour of 
inspection every morning to destroy scurrilous post- 
ers that had been put up overnight. Bill had no 
share in them after the first one, but he had started 
the ball rolling, and the freshmen and juniors kept it 
up with increasing ingenuity. People began almost 
to believe that the Sabrina men were a timid lot after 
all. 

Winter wore on to spring, with intermittent pe- 
riods of Sabrina enthusiasm when the odd-classmen 
succeeded in perpetrating some jibe that was partic- 
ularly stinging and their rivals attempted to retaliate. 
But the banquet had not yet come off, nor were there 
any immediate prospects of it. The juniors and 
freshmen began to hint very loudly that it was not to 
be this year — the sophomores had been scared into 
giving up the idea entirely. 

One day Bill came into the Kappa Chi house 
bearing the latest achievement of the juniors in his 
hands. It was only a small card, printed in pen-and- 

243 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


ink, which he had happened to see on the bulletin 
board in the post-office before it had attracted gen- 
eral attention, bearing the announcement that all 
Sabrina men were to be in Boston on the afternoon 
of the following day, where they would be met by 
the United States battleship Connecticut, which 
would take them to Key West for their banquet. 

It was one of the first pleasant spring days, and 
he found no one in the house but Colchester, who 
was at the piano giving vent to a pensive mood in 
soft and dreamy melodies. To him Bill showed the 
card. 

Colchester was not pleased at this interruption of 
his music, and he looked at the card disdainfully. 

“ That’s about the poorest yet,” he observed, 
handing it back. “ I should think they’d get tired 
of that sort of thing by this time. They said all they 
could say long ago,” and he turned back to the 
piano. 

Bill tossed the card into the fireplace. 

“ It is pretty poor,” he assented. “ But say, 
Effie, why don’t you get back at them? They say 
we don’t even dare to have the banquet now.” 

“ Don’t ask me. Butt Chanler has that to look 
out for.” 

“ I don’t mean the banquet especially. Why 
don’t you pull off some stunt that would show ’em 
we’re not afraid? ” 


244 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


“ Why do you ask me to pull off stunts? That 
sort of thing is up to your class.” 

“ But we haven’t got the statue yet.” 

Colchester answered merely with an inquiring 
look. 

“ And you have,” went on Bill. 

“ Go to Meredith, then.” 

Bill sat down on the window-seat facing the 
piano and leaned forward earnestly. 

“ You know Meredith wouldn’t be game for 
anything that was a bit different from the same old 
thing that’s always been done. Butt wouldn’t, either, 
if there was any risk in it.” 

Colchester laid his hands on the keys and struck 
into another tune. 

“ I don’t know what you’re going to do about it, 
then.” 

Please cut out that drumming and stop trying 
to bluff me. It’s you that can do something.” 

“What can I do?” Colchester was serenely 
continuing to play. 

“ Anything you want to. You know where the 
statue is.” 

If Bill was expecting Colchester to show surprise, 
he was disappointed. Effie continued his tune to the 
end, struck a leisurely final chord, and then turned 
around on the piano stool. 

“ How long have you known that? ” he asked. 

245 


17 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ Since Thanksgiving time.” 

Colchester said nothing for a moment. He 
was thinking. 

“ There wouldn’t be any object In denying It to 
you, so I won’t do It. I suppose you found It out 
some time on that trip of the Musical Clubs. But 
I would like to know how much else you know.” 

Bill flushed uncomfortably. 

“ I don’t really know anything else. I think you 
had her hidden In your barn — for a while anyway. 
I — I made a visit to your barn the night of the 
concert there. That was why I got home before the 
rest of you did.” 

Colchester’s big face wrinkled Into a smile. 

“ You didn’t find anything, did you? ” 

“ An empty box,” said Bill, his flush deepening. 

Colchester dropped his smile and spoke seriously. 

“ I suppose you did It just to see If you could 
really find It, as a sort of detective stunt. I remem- 
ber I thought of something like that at the time. 
Mildred got you pretty fussed by talking about It, 
and I thought then that perhaps there was some 
such bug floating around In your head, but I didn’t 
suppose It amounted to so much. Didn’t I say some- 
thing to you about it? ” 

“ You told me to remember that Sabrina men 
always stood together. I felt pretty bad about that. 
I thought you didn’t think I could be trusted.” 

246 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


“ Oh, no ! I just meant that as a little hint to — 
to mind your own business, to put it baldly. You 
know the best' way to stand by me, if you did think I 
was the senior guardian, was not to think any more 
about it.” 

“ Well, I did try not to, but so many things hap- 
pened that simply made me think! Your being with 
Meredith so much just about that time, and the note 
he sent you that you went around the corner to read 
and then tore up, and your being out in the barn with 
a hammer and sending that telegram after the con- 
cert ” 

He broke off, stopped by the piercing look from 
under Colchester’s lowered brows. 

“ You are an observing person. Bill,” he re- 
marked slowly. 

Bill flushed again and a hot, stinging feeling 
came to his eyes. 

“ I wasn’t spying on you! ” he cried. “ I was 
going to, but I remembered what a rotten thing it 
was to do, and I didn’t ! I know it looks funny, my 
knowing all those things, but it was just accident. 

I I was out on the street having a smoke before the 
dance, when I saw you go into the telegraph office, 

1 and I saw Tod Smith give you that note from 
Meredith on the car. I did watch to see when you 
i| read it, though. But right after that I made up my 
I mind to forget the whole business, and then I lost 
! 247 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


my head and forgot everything hut that, I got so 
excited over the idea of finding that statue. But I 
was so ashamed of it all afterwards that I never told 
a soul about it.” 

Colchester was smiling again. 

“ Pm sorry I spoke that way. I didn’t mean 
that I thought you were doing anything to be 
ashamed of. And after all, there’s no harm done. 
You didn’t find her: you couldn’t have, even if you’d 
been lots luckier than you were. Some time I’ll tell 
you why. But I’ll tell you now that all this talk 
about safe-deposit vaults is rot. Sabrina’s in just 
the kind of a place they’re howling that she ought to 
be in. They’d have a fit if they knew where. But 
they stand about as much show of finding her as they 
would if she were up at the North Pole.” 

Bill received this with a momentary silence, not 
unmixed with chagrin, for he had been one of these 
“ howlers,” and he had been as greatly fooled as 
any of them. But he was not long in returning to the 
point of his original attack. 

“ You agree with me, then, don’t you, about 
keeping things alive and not letting them become 
nothing but a dried-up old tradition? ” 

“ Sure ; I’ll prove it to you when I can tell you 
some things I can’t tell you now.” 

“ Then, Effie, listen here I Why won’t you do 
something? Bring Sabrina into town or something 
248 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


like that, and flaunt her in their faces! It could be 
done, and it would be the greatest thing that’s been 
pulled off here for years ! ” 

“Now don’t talk nonsense. Bill! I don’t own 
her, and I can’t do anything I want to with her. 
Meredith would jump off the chapel tower before 
he’d consent to any such stunt as that.” 

Bill sniffed contemptuously. 

“ Meredith’s an old woman! ” 

“No, he isn’t: he’s a mighty good leader and 
manager. He wouldn’t be the president of our 
class if he weren’t. I haven’t much more use for him 
personally than you have, but I know that he’s an 
able fellow and has good sense. I wouldn’t do 
anything he was against.” 

“ If he’s got good sense he won’t be against it. 
You just — ” 

“ Oh, you Effie Colchester! ” came a shout from 
the front lawn. “ O — oh, you E/-fie! ” 

“ It’s Tod Smith,” said Bill, glancing out the 
window. Colchester put his head out to see what 
was wanted. 

“ Come on out and hear the grass grow,” called 
Smith. “ What do you want to stay in the house for 
a day like this? ” 

“ I’ll be out in a minute,” Effie called back. “ I 
think your idea is a crazy one,” he added to Bill, 
drawing his head in again. “ But that makes me sort 
249 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


of like it. I don’t think anything of the kind will go 
through, but I’ll talk to Merry about it.” 

And he did. As he expected, Meredith flouted 
it. It was unheard of, and it was unsafe, and if it 
failed, as it was sure to do, they never could square 
themselves with the class again. But Colchester, 
having once broached the idea, grew stronger for it, 
and stronger still in the face of opposition. Butt 
Chanler was called in as a representative of the next 
even-year class, and the arguments were all gone 
over again. Butt was inclined toward the conserva- 
tive views of Meredith. 

“ That sounds like one of Ridge Bill’s schemes,” 
was his first comment. 

“ It’s a silly scheme,” said Meredith. 

‘‘ There couldn’t be anything sillier than the way 
we’ve sat around and let those juniors and freshmen 
poke fun at us for the last two months,” Colchester 
rejoined. “ It’s all right for us to keep a dignified 
silence when they call us ’f raid-cats, and say they’re 
foolish children who know not whereof they speak, 
but the fact remains that they really are getting to 
believe what they say, and that’s no game at all. We 
don’t want to go out of this college with a reputation 
like that, whether we deserve it or not, and here’s 
a chance to prove they’re mistaken and at the same 
time show ’em they’re not nearly so smart as they 
think they are.” 


250 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


That was the gist of his argument, which he 
amplified and reinforced with an ardor that finally 
silenced them both. The sight of Effie Colchester 
forsaking his slow and easy-going ways to be really 
enthusiastic and insistent about anything was unusual 
enough in itself to have some effect. And he kept at 
it till he won them over. 

“ It’s simply up to you,” said Meredith, still 
reluctant in spite of his consent. “ Perhaps you can 
do it, but don’t blame anybody else if you make a big 
fizzle of it.” 

“ Let’s forget that and get down to business,” 
rejoined Colchester, intent on completing plans and 
carrying them out right away. And the next hour 
was spent in a discussion of “ hows ” and “ whens,” 
that finally made even Meredith wake up and take 
interest, and left Butt thoroughly enthusiastic. 

The general outline of procedure was decided 
upon, but a lot of the details depended on other 
things that needed investigation. Another confer- 
ence was held in the evening in Bill’s room, where 
they were less likely to be interrupted. Bill had 
been the real instigator of the affair, and Colchester 
insisted that he should have a share in the planning. 

When the meeting finally broke up everything 
was arranged. It was only necessary to let one other 
senior into the plot and get him to help. 

“ But that’s as good as sure already,” Colchester 

251 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


assured them. “ Phil Sands will be game for any- 
thing, and he’d mortgage everything he’s got to help 
pull off a stunt like this.” 

As it turned out, Sands was “ game.” The 
principal reason that made him indispensable was 
that he owned an automobile, which he placed freely 
at their service, but in addition to that he had sug- 
gestions to offer that proved he was an excellent 
addition to the committee, and he had a summer 
home that was just the place to retreat to afterwards. 

Many more had to be taken into confidence later, 
and they decided that on the day the great event 
itself was to come off every Sabrina man in college 
was to be notified, so they could be on hand in case 
of trouble. Colchester, Meredith and Butt were to 
be the chief actors, with Sands to run the machine for 
them, and Bill was to be a sort of home guard with 
about twenty other seniors and sophomores to help 
him. 

They had to wait nearly two weeks for a time 
that seemed to them wholly suitable. The early 
coming of spring helped them, but it was necessary 
to have the roads fairly well dried up before they 
were willing to put their plan into execution. The 
last snow had gone nearly a month ago, but the frost 
in the ground still kept the fields and roadways 
muddy. 

At last came a day when it was announced in 
252 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 

chapel that the first outdoor practice of the baseball 
team would take place that afternoon. Up to then 
they had practiced only in the cage. Colchester 
looked at the sky, consulted the weather forecasts, 
and said that the time had come. Everything com- 
bined to make this just the day they had been waiting 
for, and shortly after chapel Sands’s car, with Col- 
chester, Meredith and Chanler in it, left town by the 
north road, away from the college. 

Then the “ home guard ” did what had fallen 
to their share. Those who already knew the plans 
made all in readiness, while the news was spread 
among the other even-classmen that Sabrina was 
coming to town that afternoon. She would be visible 
for a very brief time on the baseball field, and they 
were to be on hand to welcome and defend her. 
Also they were to urge, in a casual way, as many 
odd-classmen as possible to be present without tell- 
ing them any particular reason for it. By simply 
getting up a little enthusiasm for the first baseball 
practice of the season, making it seem a matter of 
giving the team a good send-off, they could gather 
crowd enough to insure a good-sized audience. 

Hawkins and McCarthy were among the sopho- 
mores that constituted the “ home guard.” They 
went down to Bill’s room after the midday meal, 
where they tried to sit down and wait patiently 
for the hours to pass. McCarthy, being a pitcher 

253. 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


on the team, would be on the field with the other ,| 
players when the big event occurred, and his part was j 
to command the protective squad on the diamond I 
and see that a clear track was open for the automo- | 
bile when it approached. Hawkins was to be one I 
of the guards at the gate, a position of importance | 
but rather too far from the real center of action to | 
suit him entirely. | 

“ You fellows are going to have all the fun,” 
he grumbled. “ I’ll be lucky if I can even see the 
doings from a distance. I don’t see why they j I 
couldn’t have put me with you : that’s where the ^ 
scrap will be if there is one, and I can scrap better 
than I can do anything else.” 

“ You’ll get all the scrapping you want guarding ^ 
that gate after the machine has passed out,” said 
Bill. “ You’ve got to hold the fort and let them y 
get away without anybody’s following.” ■( 

“ What’ll you be doing all this time? ” 

“ Scouting. I’m going to get Bobby Crane’s y: 
motorcycle and float around on that. It’ll keep it | 
away from him, and give me an advantage over the 
people on foot if anything should happen so I’d want f 
to get away fast.” | 

“ I wish three o’clock would hurry up and get 
here,” said McCarthy, pulling out his watch for 
about the ’steenth time. 

Three o’clock was a long time coming. Even 

254 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


then there would be an hour to wait, but at three 
Butt was going to telephone if all was well with the 
approaching goddess. They went over to the house 
to await his message, which arrived in due course, 
and then repaired to the field. 

So great a crowd, merely for baseball practice, 
might well have caused remark, for the Sabrina men, 

( by each waylaying an odd-classman and carelessly 
a suggesting that they see how the team was showing 
j up, had succeeded in having over three-quarters of 
S the college present. But remarks, even if they were 

i made, did not develop into suspicion that anything 

ii unusual was to take place, and the crowd settled 
I themselves in the bleachers or around the edge of the 
ji diamond just as if they had come to watch a game. 
I McCarthy and the others of the squad who 
I knew what was coming hurried up the practice so 
i that it began shortly after half-past three, and the 
i senior cheer-leader started some singing and yelling 
] so that the fellows would be kept with something to 
i do during the intervening half hour. 

j “ It’s a good time for us to practice, too,” he 
j told them. “ Now, a long yell for the team! Hip, 

' hip ” 

i No one not in the secret noticed that at the main 
I gate lingered a little squad of seniors and sopho- 
mores. At the other entrance, away across the field 
: on the Southboro road and partly out of sight of the 
i 255 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


bleachers, was another. Through this the automo- 
bile was to make its entrance. 

Bill had borrowed Crane’s motorcycle, as he 
had often done before, and was serenely chugging 
around the cinder track, feeling like a member of 
the mounted police. His eyes, when they were not 
watching the Southboro gate, kept looking up to the 
chapel clock, plainly visible over the leafless trees. 
There was only five minutes to wait now. 

Suddenly he caught sight of an automobile ap- 
proaching the main gate and sent his machine flying 
over to meet it. What had happened to cause this 
change of plan? The men on the bleachers had not 
seen it yet, for the grand stand stood in their way. 
Then, as the guard threw open the gate, he saw that 
it was someone else — a junior named Morrison, wav- 
ing his hand gayly as he steered by the little crowd, 
who stared at one another in consternation. 

“ Bill ! ” cried Hawkins, running up excitedly. 
“ You’ve got to meet them and warn them that 
Morry has his machine here. He can follow 
them ! ” 

“ That’s up to you 1 ” said Bill as he turned 
around. “ You mustn’t let him through the gate ! ” 

The men on the bleachers, in the midst of their 
singing, suddenly heard a “ Honk I Honk ! ” behind 
them and turned, startled. Morrison had passed 
behind the grand stand unseen and drawn up in the 
256 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


track directly back of them. For an instant they 
thought it was Meredith and one or two let out a 
shout of welcome before they discovered their mis- 
take. 

“ Greetings ! ” cried Morrison, honking his horn 
by way of salutation. “ What goes on? ” 

‘‘The grand opening of the season,’' cried a 
senior in answer. “ Come up here, you bloated 
aristocrat, and mingle with the common people a 
' while. We’re having some singing and we need your 
voice. 

As Morrison had no voice, that was a palpable 
falsehood, but at the urgent shouts which backed up 
the senior’s invitation he descended from his car and 
mounted into the bleachers. 

“ Just for a few minutes,” he said, squeezing 
himself into the place they made for him. “ That 
new steed of mine is impatient, and he wants to take 
another spin. Isn’t it a dandy? Dad’s man brought 
it up as far as Southboro this morning ” 

But no one was listening to him now. Over 
across the diamond another car had appeared, en- 
tering by the Southboro gate, and half the men in 
the bleachers were watching it breathlessly. Slowly 
it breasted the little rise of ground just beyond the 
edge of right field and turned into the cinder track. 
The men were silent. Most of those who were not 
looking for it had not yet seen the approaching car, 
257 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


which left the track, and slightly heightening Its 
speed began to cross the diamond. 

“Here, fellows!” called the baseball captain, 
who had gone over to the coaches’ bench, and, led 
by McCarthy, the players followed him, wondering. 

The car came nearer, but still the men were 
silent. The cheer-leader stood with one arm raised 
as if to give a signal, his face turned to watch the 
approaching car. It slowed down as it came near 
the center of the field, and, opposite the bleachers, 
almost stopped. Everyone was watching it now. 

Sands was driving, with Colchester beside him. 
In the tonneau were Meredith and Butt, with some- 
thing else. Suddenly they stooped over to lift it, 
and the cheer-leader, still watching them, threw up 
his other arm with the shout: “ Come on — now! ” 
Every Sabrina man In the bleachers was stand- 
ing with bared head, and at the leader’s shout they 
broke into their song : 

“ All hail, Sabrina dear ! ” 


But an Instant later they themselves drowned 
their own singing in a mighty shout as the covering 
slipped from the thing which the men in the machine 
were holding up, and the goddess was revealed. For 
a full minute the car stopped and Sabrina was held in 
plain view, gleaming dully in the sunlight, then she 
258 


THE GODDESS HERSELF 


was lowered again and with a sudden spurt the car 
sped toward the gate. 

For that minute the odd-classmen had been 
stricken motionless by surprise. Then as they real- 
ized what had happened they leaped from the bleach- 
ers with a wild yell. The others tried to hold them, 
and the ground was strewn with tumbling forms. 
Morrison found himself held on both sides, but with 
three sweeping blows — and Morrison was a football 
man — he was free and had jumped over the top seat. 

But already Sands was safe outside, far up the 
road, and Bill speeding along beside him, and the 
gate was closed again, with Hawkins and his men on 
guard. 


CHAPTER XI 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 
HE goddess had come and gone, and only 



one odd-classman had got anywhere near the 


chariot in which she was whirled away. 


That man was Bobby Crane. 

He had been getting a drink of water at the 
faucet beside the grand stand when he heard the 
first note of the Sabrina war chant, and, hurrying 
out to learn the meaning of the shout that followed, 
he had stood directly in the path of Sands’s car as 
it sped toward the gate. He was not just sure what 
was happening, but he realized plainly that it had 
to do with Sabrina and that these men in the auto- 
mobile were fleeing. He recklessly tried to jump 
aboard as it swerved by, but they were ready and 
Meredith gave him a shove that sent him tumbling 
to the ground. He was up again instantly, but the 
car was already at the open gate, with Bill close 
behind it on his motorcycle. 


“ Bill! Bill! ” he yelled. “ Give me that ma- 
chine ! ” 


260 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


But Bill kept on without even turning his head, 
and already they were closing the gate behind 
him. 

Then came a fight at the gate that is only wait- 
ing for some Tresham bard to put it into verse to 
go down into the college annals as another “ Horatius 
at the Bridge.” Before and since, Husky Hawkins 
won much glory for himself and the college by his 
prowess on the football field, but never did he do 
anything to equal the carnage he wrought that day 
protecting Sabrina’s retreat. With Durham and a 
half dozen others to help him he kept the gate from 
being opened, while the rest, held at bay, friend 
and enemy alike, fought among themselves just in- 
side. For a quarter of an hour it lasted, then some 
seniors called a halt. Those who had been vainly 
trying to climb over the fence were allowed to do so, 
and the gate was opened for those who preferred 
that way of exit. The very first was Morrison, 
raising his speed in defiance of every automobile law 
ever made, and in less than a minute he had disap- 
peared up the road. 

It was a long and weary line that straggled up 
from the field when all the scrimmage was over. 
Many had run ahead to learn if Sands had passed 
through the town, and which way he had gone, but 
most of them realized that there was nothing more 
they could do. If he was safely away, they could 
18 261 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


neither help nor hinder him, and the only chance of 
pursuit lay in Morrison and his machine. 

The thing had been successfully accomplished, 
and the scoffers were silenced. Those who had been 
guilty of the numerous posters that had been appear- 
ing through the winter had achieved their object: 
they had goaded the Sabrina men into doing some- 
thing daring even beyond all hopes. But they had 
gained nothing by it. It had resulted only in a 
triumphant stroke for their rivals that answered 
their taunting jibes once and for all. 

Burnet had been in the thickest of the battle, 
among the leaders who had charged the gate in a 
vain attempt to open a way for Morrison. After it 
was over he repaired to the house to get cleaned up, 
and there he learned news of the fugitives. 

Donnel, who, because he was a junior, had not 
known of any special reason for attending baseball 
practice that afternoon, had just been coming out of 
the house on his way to the library when Sands’s ma- 
chine dashed by. He paid no particular attention to 
it, except to notice that it was going pretty fast, and 
proceeded on his way. At the corner of the South- 
boro road he heard the distant rumblings of the fray 
that was then at its height down on the field, and as 
he stopped to listen, wishing that someone would 
happen along to tell him the meaning of it, Morri- 
son came speeding up the hill, threw on the brake 
262 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 

and came to an abrupt stop In the middle of the 
road. 

“Have you seen Phil Sands?” he demanded 
breathlessly. 

“Yes; he just went down by our house, full 
speed.” 

“ How long ago? ” 

“ About a quarter of an hour — maybe a little 
longer. What’s the matter? ” 

But Morrison did not stop to answer. He was 
off again In an Instant In hot pursuit. 

Donnel went on to the library, got his book, and 
returned to the house. By that time Burnet had 
come up from the field, with a very wild tale to tell 
of much fighting and Sabrina. Donnel listened to It 
skeptically. 

“ They didn’t have Sabrina ! ” he exclaimed. 
“ They wouldn’t have the nerve to bring her right 
into town like that. It must have been a fake statue. 
Did you see It yourself? ” 

“ Of course I did! It was the real thing, I tell 
you 1 ” 

“ How do you know? You never saw her be- 
fore.” 

Burnet disdained to argue against any such state- 
ment as that, and went up to the bathroom to remove 
the stains of battle. But Donnel followed, eager to 
hear more In spite of his skepticism, and Burnet went 

263. 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


over all the details while he splashed about under 
the shower. 

“ It makes me sick,” he ended. “ We may never 
get another chance at her for years, and there they 
walked away from us as if we were a lot of helpless 
infants.” 

“ Perhaps they won’t get away after all,” said 
Donnel. “ Morrison’s on their trail, and if he once 
catches up with them there’ll be a mix-up worth 
seeing. I’m sorry for Sabrina if he does. Morry 
can manage any two men that Phil Sands has with 
him.” 

Burnet stood stock-still under the running water. 

“How do you know?” he demanded. 

“ I saw him. I saw Sands go by the house, and 
then Morry came along and I told him which way 
they had gone.” 

“ Did he follow them?” 

“ Of course.” 

“ Who was with him? ” 

“ Bobby Crane and A1 Thornton and Ned Wil- 
kins.” 

Burnet turned off the water, smiling broadly. 

“ I guess there will be some mix-up if they get 
together. Do you think Morry’s machine is as fast 
as Phil’s?” 

Donnel did not know, but they both felt that this 
latest Sabrina episode was not yet closed, and might 
264 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


still end in glory for the sons of Noughty-Odd. 
Others thought so, too, when they learned that Mor- 
rison was in pursuit, and all the evening the students 
of Tresham College waited eagerly for some news 
of the chase. 

The chase, meanwhile, was even more Interesting 
than those waiting imagined. As Sands’s car climbed 
the little hill from the athletic field the three who had 
been holding up the statue breathed long sighs of 
relief. Sands himself was too intent on driving the 
car to indulge In any sighs yet. The tension of that 
ride across the diamond had been greater than any 
of them realized till It was over. Their foreheads 
were damp and their nerves fluttered now the crisis 
was past and they could relax and He back In their 
seats. None of them spoke, except that Butt mechan- 
ically arranged the blanket so It covered the statue 
more securely; none of them even moved. They 
simply sat Inert, drawing deep breaths. 

Up Into the town they sped, down the street past 
the Kappa Chi House, on under the railroad bridge 
and Into the open country. Bill followed close behind 
them — just why he could not have told except that he 
had an uncertain idea that he must be on hand If they 
needed help. 

As they began to climb into the hills that lie to 
the east of Tresham, he pushed ahead and came 
alongside the car. 


265 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ There’s no need of your coming with us,” said 
Meredith, apparently noticing him for the first time. 

“ Do you want me to go back? ” asked Bill. 

“ You might as well,” answered Colchester. 
‘‘ There wouldn’t be anything you could do. That 
thing you’re riding on might run down, too, and 
you wouldn’t want to get stranded out here in the 
woods.” 

“ Bobby said it would run fifty miles anyway. 
He had some stuff put in only the other day, and he 
hasn’t used it any since.” 

Bill hated to be put off like that. Here was ad- 
venture of just the kind he thirsted for, and he must 
leave it to others. But he wouldn’t stay where they 
didn’t want him, and he prepared to turn around. 

“ Is there anything you want me to do when I 
get back? ” he asked. 

“No, only to tell them we’ve gone some other 
way. I don’t suppose they know which road we took, 
but Morrison would follow us to San Francisco if he 
thought we’d gone there.” 

“All right. Good luck!” And Bill turned 
back. 

He rode along rather slowly, for his former zest 
had gone out of the enterprise. Still he kept a look- 
out ahead. If Morrison had by any chance taken 
this road it would not be hard for him to follow 
them. The track of Sands’s machine showed plainly 
266 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


in the road, which was still soft and muddy in 
places. Automobiles did not pass this way so often 
that there would be any doubt about who had made 
them. 

He had gone perhaps a mile when he saw an- 
other car some distance down the road coming 
toward him. He did not need to wait to see who 
it was. It could be no one but Morrison. He turned 
back again, ait his highest speed, to warn them. In 
twenty minutes he had overtaken them again, for 
Sands, feeling secure now, was going more easily 
and talking with the other three over the way things 
had turned out. He slowed up still more at Bill’s 
shout. 

“ Morrison’s coming,” he called. “ He’ll catch 
up with you in five minutes at this rate.” 

They did not wait for anything else. The car 
shot forward at full speed. Bill made no attempt to 
follow them. Instead, he dismounted and wheeled 
the motorcycle into the woods that lined one side of 
the road. There were no leaves yet to screen him, 
but the trees were fairly thick and Morrison’s party 
would all be looking ahead. There was little danger 
that they would see him. He meant to wait till they 
had passed and then follow on behind. No turning 
back for him now. 

The fellows in the front car were thinking hard 
as they flew along. They had not counted on being 
267 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


followed : they had not known until Bill told them at 
the Southboro gate that Morrison had a car, or they 
would not have taken the direct way they were going. 
Now the problem was not so much to outdistance 
him as to elude him. Somehow they must throw him 
off the track, for he must not know where they went. 
They had the statue to hide, and it was dangerous for 
even the part of the country they were in to be 
known. 

‘‘ There’s a town a couple of miles ahead,” said 
Sands. 

They consulted hastily and decided to go around 
it. If they passed directly through they would be 
seen, and Morrison would have no trouble at all in 
tracing them. 

Sands knew the direct way to where they were 
going, but not the byroads. They had been going 
almost straight east. Now they turned to the north, 
with no idea where it would bring them, but hoping 
thus to lose their pursuers. It turned out to be a 
questionable move, for they found themselves in a 
road that was narrow and full of deep ruts where 
heavy wagons had passed through the mud, which 
was beginning to harden with the coming cold of 
night. 

“ We’ll never get anywhere on a road like this,” 
said Sands, trying to steer between a ditch on one 
side and the deep mud on the other. 

268 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


“ Just keep on till we get out of sight of the main 
road, then we can turn back,” said Colchester. 

But luck was not with them. Just ahead was a 
huge puddle, stretching clear across the road. Sands 
swore as he saw it, and tried to steer through what 
looked like the shallowest part. They were almost 
through when the car stopped moving. The wheels 
kept going, but not an inch did they progress. 

“ There we are ! ” exclaimed Sands disgustedly. 
‘‘ We’ll have to get out and shove her through. 
We’re not out of sight, either.” 

“ Maybe they won’t think to look this way if they 
come along before we get started,” said Colchester 
as they climbed out of the car. 

“ Maybe they won’t come along at all! ” mut- 
tered Sands sarcastically. 

They did come along, however, while the three 
were still pushing and straining to get the car out of 
the mudhole. They heard the sound of Morrison’s 
machine, and looking around saw it, not a hun- 
dred rods away, as it went straight on past the cross- 
road. 

“ They didn’t see us I ” cried Butt. “ Why can’t 
we go back now instead of going ahead? They’ll 
keep on going: they won’t think they’ve passed us.” 

“ That’s the thing to do,” said Sands. ‘‘ See if 
you can push her backwards. Wait a second! ” and 
he threw in the reverse. “ Now push! ” 

269 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

That worked better. The car moved, and at 
length the front wheels were out of the water. 

“ That’s all right,” called Sands. “ Walt a shake 
now and I’ll see If I can’t turn round. It’s a crime 
to have a road like this In a Christian country.” 

Turning around was a difficult matter, and while 
Sands was still maneuvering to accomplish It suc- 
cessfully, Butt gave a sudden cry of consternation. 

“ They’re coming back! ” he exclaimed. 

It was so. As Bill had foreseen, the tracks of 
Sands’s car had served as a guide to Morrison. He 
had not gone far past the cross-road when he saw 
that they were no longer visible, and he had straight- 
way turned back to find out what had become of 
them. Crane saw the stalled car at the same Instant 
that Butt saw them, and he let out a yell of glee. 

“ There they are I ” he cried. “ They’re stuck! ” 

“ Look out you don’t get stuck, too,” spoke 
Thornton warningly as Morrison turned out from 
the main road. 

“ We can’t get through here,” said Morrison, 
bringing the car to a stop. “ What shall we do? ” 

Within hailing distance of one another, the two 
parties, pursuers and pursued, held separate councils 
of war. And while they conferred Bill came along 
on the motorcycle. He stopped within a few rods of 
Morrison’s car, where Crane was the first to catch 
sight of him. 


270 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


“ Ridgeway Bill,” he cried, you’re a thief and 
a rascal I Do you realize that that is my machine 
which you are using for a devilish purpose, and that 
when you kept it against my will you were commit- 
ting an act of thievery? ” 

Bill grinned. 

“ Aren’t you planning how you can do something 
of the same kind right now? ” he asked. 

“ That doesn’t make any difference. You hand 
over my property.” 

“ Please, Bobby, I’m not through with it yet. 
Besides, you’ve got something a lot more aristocratic 
to ride in, and I couldn’t get home if I didn’t have 
this.” 

“ Cut out kidding with him and get down to busi- 
ness,” said Thornton, impatiently. “ They’ve got 
Sabrina there in the machine. I can see her covered 
up with a blanket. Shall we make a rush for it and 
fight it out?” 

“ I don’t see what else there is to do. They 
won’t hand her over peaceably, though we might ask 
them, just to see.” 

“ Come on, then,” and Thornton jumped out of 
the car. “ You’ll have to leave the machine, Morry. 
We need your strong right arm.” 

The others followed Thornton, who started to 
lead the way down the road. They were four against 
four, not counting Bill, and Morrison was worth two. 
271 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


When they had gone about half the distance they 
stopped. 

“ Hello ! ” called Crane genially. 

There was no reply at first, then Colchester an- 
swered: 

“ Hello.” 

“You have something with you we want very 
much,” Crane went on. 

“ We haven’t a doubt of it,” Colchester re- 
sponded. 

“ Will you hand it over to us In a kindly and gen- 
tlemanly fashion, or shall we come and get it? ” 

“ I’m afraid you’ll have to try to come and 
get it.” 

“ Oh, very well. You compel us to do something 
that Is extremely distasteful, but I suppose you know 
your own minds. Come on,” Crane added, starting 
forward again. Sands had finally got his car turned 
around and the other three were getting Into It again. 

Suddenly there came a loud report, as of a gun 
being fired, from Morrison’s auto. Morrison turned 
with an oath. Another report followed, and a few 
seconds later another. 

“Look what he’s doing!” he cried, running 
back, with the others following. 

During the Interchange of words between Crane 
and Colchester, Bill had been hunting through Mor- 
rison’s tool kit for something pointed. He found 
272 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


what he was looking for, and with it proceeded de- 
liberately to puncture Morrison’s tires. As Morri- 
son started running back a fourth report told that 
the job was completed. Bill tossed the tool into the 
tonneau with a laugh and mounted the motorcycle 
again. He retreated to the cross-roads and there 
dismounted to await further developments. 

Morrison surveyed the ruin, swearing fluently. 

“ That fixes us,” he exclaimed. “ I’ve only got 
two extra tubes.” 

“ Looks like first blood for the other side,” re- 
marked Crane. “ Ridge Bill,” he added, raising his 
voice, “ that’s your second offense to-day. You’ll be 
a hardened criminal if you aren’t careful.” 

“Will you be serious, Bobby?” cried Thornton 
angrily. “ This isn’t getting Sabrina or anything 
else.” 

“ What’s the use of getting sore? ” asked Crane 
placidly. “ If I can’t fight in a nice friendly fashion, 
I won’t fight.” 

“ You’re the limit, that’s all I can say,” said 
Thornton, disgustedly. 

“ They’re going to try to get by I ” cried Wilkins, 
looking back. 

They were, for a fact. With head bent low 
Sands was sending his car forward full speed. He 
would have to turn into the ditch to avoid crashing 
into Morrison’s disabled machine, but by good luck 

273 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


and brushing close he might get by. Thornton and 
Wilkins braced themselves to spring at the car as it 
passed, while Morrison hunted feverishly about In 
his tonneau for the pointed tool Bill had used, long- 
ing wrathfully to give some return for those punc- 
tured tires. 

Crane, meanwhile, had coolly taken his stand In 
the ditch, directly In the path of the oncoming car. 

“ Get out of the way, you fool ! cried Thornton 
in alarm. “ You’ll get run over! ” 

“ No, I won’t,” responded Crane, serenely. 
“ They’ll stop before they’ll do that.” 

He was right. Sands was already putting on the 
brake and Crane broke Into a low laugh at the effec- 
tiveness of his simple little move, when Bill Inter- 
fered again. With a long, low dive he tackled Crane 
football fashion, flinging him safely over the ditch 
and leaving the path clear. He was up again and 
scudding back to the motorcycle before Crane could 
pick himself together, and it was too late now for 
him to repeat his maneuver. Sands was already driv- 
ing past, but the slowing up had spoiled his Impetus, 
and the car wallowed and almost came to a stop as 
it struck the ditch. Thornton and Wilkins both 
sprang for the back seat, which Colchester was help- 
ing to defend, but they were two against three and 
the advantage with the three. The best they could 
do was to drag out Meredith with them as they fell 
274 



“ They came speeding on, desperately trying to improve every 
minute they had gained.” 





FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


back to the ground. It had been a brief fight, barely 
a minute long, which Morrison had wasted in a vain 
attempt to find Bill’s tool of destruction. 

“ Keep on! ” cried Colchester to Sands as they 
swerved into the middle of the road again. “ We’re 
free of them now, and they’ll take care of Merry.” 

So they kept on, turning back into the main road 
and on in the direction they had taken at first. Bill 
had gone on ahead, and he slowed up to wait as they 
came speeding on, desperately trying to improve 
every minute they had gained on their pursuers. 

“ Effie I ” cried Butt, ‘‘ can’t we take Bill along? ” 

Sands began to slow up before Colchester had 
time to answer. 

“ He deserves to come if he wants to,” he said. 

“Come on. Bill!” called Colchester. “Shake 
that contrivance you’ve got and ride like a gentle- 
man. You’ll have to work your way, though.” 

Bill was willing. He got into the tonneau with 
Butt, grinning joyfully. 

“ Bobby wants his machine, anyway,” he said. 
“ He began teasing me for it even before we left 
Tresham. I guess he’ll find it there, all right.” 

And on they sped again. 

“ That was a great stunt of yours, spoiling their 
tires,” exclaimed Butt in admiration. 

“ It will hold them there for a while. How long 
before they can fix them, Phil? ” 

275 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


“ An hour and a half, anyway, and probably 
more. I don’t believe he’s got four new tires,” 
Sands shouted back without turning his head. 
“ We’ve got that much start on them, anyway.” 

A town lay ahead of them, and they went more 
slowly till they had passed through its quiet streets. 
Then their way lay among the hills again, by a rough 
and narrow road that made rapid going impossible. 
Here dusk began to fall upon them, and now that the 
sun was gone the chill March night set them to shiv- 
ering. 

“ I guess we’ll need that blanket more than old 
Sabrina will,” exclaimed Bill, his teeth chattering. 

“ There are some robes under the seat,” said 
Sands. “ You’d better get them out.” 

It was an odd-looking carful that passed through 
the next town, each man muffled closely in a big lap- 
robe, but it was dark now, and few people saw them 
as they sped silently through and on up the valley 
that lay beyond. 

“ We’ll hit the state road pretty soon after we 
cross this next ridge,” said Sands. “ Then we can 
let her out.” 

For hours they kept on, through cities, towns and 
quiet villages, with stretches of lonely countryside 
between. Bill crouched down under his blanket, 
shivering now and then with something that was 
more than cold. Pressing against his knee was the 
276 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


statue. By reaching out his hand he could touch her. 
What wouldn’t hundreds of men back in Tresham 
give to be where he was now? 

He did not know where they were, but he didn’t 
ask. Sands was the guide now, with a definite goal 
ahead of him, and only once did they stop. That was 
to eat, which they did hastily at a little lunch cart in 
a small town through which they passed, while Sands 
visited the local bicycle repairer, who also kept auto- 
mobile supplies, and laid in a fresh supply of gaso- 
line. Then they were off again, for their destination 
was still hours away. 

Suddenly Bill sat up straight with an eager sniff. 

“Do you smell it?” he exclaimed. “It’s the 
ocean! ” 

“ We’ll be there in an hour more,” said Sands 
shortly. 

After a time they came within sight of the sea, 
and their way led along a road that wound in and 
out among flat salt marshes. On their right the 
water gleamed cold and silvery under the moon, and 
a biting wind blew inland, keen with the smell of the 
salt ocean. 

“Gee, I’m hungry!” exclaimed Butt. “Will 
there be anything to eat, Phil? ” 

“ I guess we can find something. We’re ’most 
there now.” 

A sharp turn took them through a wood of dark 
19 277 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


pines, then a short stretch of open road to a tall gate- 
way in a wall of stone. Sands stopped the car and 
got out. 

“ We’re here,” he announced, fumbling in his 
pocket for some keys. In fifteen minutes they were 
inside a big cottage, searching in the cellar for fire- 
wood. In another a huge fire was blazing in the hall 
fireplace, with the four cold and weary fugitives rav- 
enously eating crackers before it. 

“ I don’t believe there’s another thing to eat in 
the place,” said Sands apologetically. “ I thought 
there was some canned stuff somewhere but I can’t 
find it.” 

“ These crackers help tremendously,” said Col- 
chester, stowing away another mouthful. 

Just inside the doorway stood Sabrina, the fire- 
light striking dull gleams from her smooth bronze 
surface. With a cracker in each hand Bill stood 
gazing at her. 

“ What do you think of her? ” asked Colchester. 
“ Rather well preserved, isn’t she, for a lady of her 
years and adventures?” 

Bill did not answer. The sight of that war-worn 
statue gave him a strange feeling that made him for- 
get to eat. It was like a thrill, only somehow it 
choked him, too, and brought a sudden warmth into 
his throat and behind his eyes. It was only a piece of 
brass, of no great beauty even in the days before 
278 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


it had been so knocked about as the plaything of a 
lot of boys. But those very boys had fought for her 
with the same splendid ardor that would have car- 
ried them forward under the fire and smoke of bat- 
tle, and paid her an homage that was no less loyal 
because It was the homage of youth, rendered half 
playfully and In a year or two to be looked back upon 
with a smile. Would years and wisdom bring any- 
thing that could Inspire quite the same joyous, whole- 
hearted devotion that this scarred old goddess 
awoke. If only for a fleeting minute. In the hearts of 
her followers? 

“ It — It sort of gives you a queer feeling, doesn’t 
it ? ” asked Butt, and with a start Bill realized that 
the others were standing at his side. 

“ That’s what makes It worth while,” said Col- 
chester, and his tone had dropped the jaunty note of 
a moment ago. “ I don’t know exactly what it Is 
— perhaps It’s what she stands for to us, sticking to- 
gether and all that — but there aren’t many things 
that give you the thrill this old statue does when you 
first see her.” Colchester was a senior, but he was 
not yet very old. 

Sands turned back to the fire and threw another 
piece of wood on the blaze, which broke the spell 
that had settled upon them. 

“ I suppose she’s safe enough anywhere here In 
the house for the time she’ll need to be here,” he 
279 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


said, coming down to practical matters. “ But I 
thought it would be a good stunt to put her down 
cellar. We can bury her under the woodpile there 
and all the odds in Christendom couldn’t find her.” 

“ It’ll give her a change, anyway. I wonder if 
she was ever hidden under a woodpile before? ” 

“Where did you have her, Effie?” asked Bill. 
“ Can’t I know now? ” 

Colchester laughed. 

“ I don’t see why not. I left her stored in a 
warehouse down in New York last year, and then 
this fall I had her sent home, and put in the barn 
there.” He paused, his eyes twinkling. 

“How long was she there?” demanded Bill 
eagerly. 

“ Till Christmas time. She was in a box in an 
empty stall for a while, with a lot of other old rub- 
bish, and then when I found out the Musical Clubs 
were going to perform in town at Thanksgiving, I 
thought I’d make certain sure about having her safe, 
so she was buried down in the barn cellar. I have 
since learned that that was a wise precaution, for 
if it hadn’t been done she would have been dis- 
covered.” 

“How?” asked Sands. 

“ Oh, someone suspected that I had charge of 
her, and he got a hunch to look in that barn. And 
he looked.” 


280 


FLIGHT AND PURSUIT 


“That was you, Ridge Bill!” cried Butt. 
“ Wasn’t it, now? ” 

Bill looked too guilty to make it worth while 
denying the accusation. A kind of shame was still 
uppermost in the mingled feelings with which he 
remembered that Thanksgiving night’s adventure. 
But the others, even Butt, thought it was a good 
joke. 

“ Then during the first part of Christmas vaca- 
tion I took her down to New York again, to have 
her there for the banquet, but when that didn’t come 
off I took her back to Tresham. It has been a good 
many years since she was there last, and I thought 
she might like to have a look at the old town again. 
She’s been there till this afternoon.” 

“ Then you didn’t even have to leave town to 
get her? ” 

“ We did leave town and rode around the coun- 
try a little while, but that was all a bluff. We got her 
at exactly half-past three this afternoon.” 

“ I think we’d better be putting her away again 
if we want to get any sleep at all to-night. It’s after 
twelve now, and we want to be away from here be- 
fore daylight,” said Sands. 

“ All right: lead the way,” said Colchester. 

It took an hour to conceal the statue to their sat- 
isfaction. When it was done they stretched out on 
the floor in front of the fire for a little sleep: the 
281 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


beds upstairs were too damp to be useable without a 
lot of drying out. It was still dark when Sands awoke 
them again. 

“ It’s time we were starting,” he announced. 
“ You’d better get some more blankets. They’re 
upstairs in the front room. It’s grown a lot colder.” 

It had indeed. With all their class spirit, they 
grumbled as they helped put out that lovely, warm 
fire and took their seats in the waiting machine. 
But it was Sands who had the hard time. The 
others curled themselves up and got some sleep, but 
there was no more sleep for Philip till he got back 
to college. 

They reached Southboro late in the forenoon, 
and took the trolley car from there to Tresham, 
that their return might be as inconspicuous as pos- 
sible. Bill went straight to his room for a nap, and 
Butt with him, and Colchester had to run the gaunt- 
let of questions that awaited him at the house alone. 


CHAPTER XII 


THE FINISH 


they soon learned, Morrison had become 



discouraged and returned to Tresham, with 


difficulty, the night before, disgusted with the 
pursuit. For two hundred separate hopes died when 
the tidings spread that he had come back empty- 
handed, and among them a vigorous one that had 
been carefully nursed all the evening by Theodore 
Burnet. 

“We don’t deserve to get Sabrina, anyway!” 
he exclaimed, disgustedly. “ I’ve always tried to 
make myself believe It was luck that has helped 
them keep her all this time, but there’s something 
besides that. They’ve got something we haven’t, 
that’s all. You can call it nerve or courage or 
anything you like, but If we’d been the ones with 
that statue and they’d got as near to It as we 
did, they’d have managed to get her away. I’ll bet 
on it.” 

For Meredith had told his tale with great gusto, 
and all Thornton’s and Morrison’s denials could not 


283 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


down it. The four who had spent the night at the 
beach found that they were heroes on their return to 
college and were besieged for their individual ver- 
sions of the adventure. 

Each had some particular item to add that the 
others had overlooked, and altogether it made an- 
other very interesting chapter to add to the history 
of the goddess. But regarding what had happened 
after they left Crane’s motorcycle lying by the road- 
side, none of them had a word to say. Meredith was 
the only man in Tresham College who heard the rest 
of the tale. 

Only one thing made Bill uneasy, and when he 
told it to the others they laughed at him. Crane had 
not yet returned. According to Meredith, he had 
picked up his discarded machine and announced that 
he was going to continue the pursuit by himself. 
Since then they had not seen him. 

“ He followed us: that’s what he did,” exclaimed 
Bill. 

“ He couldn’t have,” said Colchester confidently. 
‘‘ You know yourself you couldn’t keep up with us on 
that thing of his when we were really going, and we 
really went after we left them. Even if he could 
have tracked us for a while — and I don’t believe he 
could — his old engine would have given out before 
he’d been forty miles. Do you know we went nearly 
a hundred and fifty miles last night? ” 

284 


THE FINISH 


“ Well, I won’t feel easy till I see him back in 
town and know where he’s been.” 

You’ll see him back, all right, when he gets 
ready to come, but I doubt if you find out where he’s 
been unless he happens to want to tell you. Bobby 
Crane does queer things and goes to queer places 
when he goes away, and he usually has sense enough 
not to tell about them.” 

Crane did not return till a day later, and as Col- 
chester had prophesied, he kept his own counsel as to 
where he had been. He cast an alluring air of mys- 
tery about it, but those who knew him well knew also 
that he always did that, and would not gratify him 
by appearing curious. 

Nor would Bill, for he saw at once that it would 
do no good. Crane made an elaborate pretense of 
shying away when he saw Bill coming. 

“ Ridgeway Bill, I wish you wouldn’t come near 
me,” he said, retreating precipitately. “ You’re a 
thief and a despoiler of other men’s property, and I 
don’t want to be corrupted by your society.” 

Bill grinned as if he enjoyed the little joke thor- 
oughly. 

I returned your motorcycle in excellent condi- 
tion, and you lent it to me of your own free will.” 

“ That’s dodging. You borrowed it under false 
pretenses. Ridgeway, you are ‘ Old Slouch ’ no 
longer. That was a title of honor and esteem, which 
285 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


I gave you under the mistaken idea that you were an 
honest man. And you turn out to be a Raffles in- 
stead 1 ” 

Which was as serious as anything Bill could get 
out of him. But his uneasiness was not allayed. Not 
till he knew positively where Crane had gone when 
he left Morrison and the others would he be satis- 
fied that Sabrina’s present hiding place was not in 
danger. He resolved to keep a watch on Crane, 
which was no easy thing to do, because not only did 
Crane live away across the town from him, but he 
had played detective with Bill too often in fun not to 
know his methods. The best Bill could do was to 
watch for him in the places where he was accustomed 
to seeing him — in chapel, at certain recitations, on 
the street, and at not too frequent visits to Crane’s 
fraternity house. 

As a matter of fact Bill’s fears had more founda- 
tion than he knew. Crane had followed Sands and 
his car for only a few miles that day and then seen 
that it was a useless effort. ‘ But he knew where 
Sands’s summer home was, and putting two and two 
together, according to Bill’s own way, had arrived 
at the conclusion that that was where they might 
have taken the statue. Leaving his motorcycle in a 
garage he had gone on to the shore by train, not with 
any immediate hope of finding Sabrina, but to learn 
whether Sands had been in the neighborhood or not. 
286 


THE FINISH 


That proved a difficult thing to learn, for Sands had 
come and gone by night, when the few people who 
lived thereabouts were safe at home and in bed; but 
he persevered, and the results of a long day’s in- 
quiries quite satisfied him. He had finally found an 
old man who lived close to a railway crossing which 
it was his business to stand guard over at train- 
passing time, and in return for a cheap cigar he fur- 
nished Crane with the information that twice during 
the night he had heard an automobile pass — once at 
about eleven o’clock and the second time at about 
dawn. 

That was as much as Crane could learn for the 
present. The chances were that the automobile had 
been Sands’s, and on that supposition he set about 
making plans. These plans could not be put into 
action right away, however. 

Sands would be leaving with the Musical Clubs 
for their Easter trip in two weeks, provided he was 
successful in getting off a condition that otherwise 
would compel him to stay at home. When he was 
safely started on this trip. Crane had a most care- 
fully laid scheme to carry out. It was a bold scheme, 
but its very boldness was the only thing that could 
make it succeed. 

The Easter vacation was to commence on a 
Thursday, and the clubs were to leave for the first 
concert of their trip that morning. Crane planned 
287 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


to leave town Thursday morning also, but a casual 
visit to Sands’s room caused him to change suddenly. 
Sands was very doubtful, apparently, about being 
able to go on that trip. The condition was not made 
up, and he was not at all confident that he could pass 
the examination which a well-wishing professor was 
to vouchsafe unto him at the last minute. If he 
couldn’t he was going home. 

This casual visit of Crane’s took place on Mon- 
day. He left the same night for Boston, where 
Sands’s family lived in the winter. The carrying out 
of -his scheme required even more boldness than he 
had counted on at first, but Crane was nothing if not 
bold. 

It worked beautifully. By Tuesday noon he had 
presented himself at the Sands’s city house as a col- 
lege mate of Philip’s, told a most plausible story to 
Mrs. Sands, and left with the key to their seaside 
home in his pocket. 

By eleven o’clock Tuesday morning Bill knew for 
a fact that Crane had left town, and was closeted 
with Sands, telling the fears that fact had aroused in 
him. 

‘‘You’re nutty. Bill!” exclaimed Sands, impa- 
tiently. “ Clean out of your head! Crane hasn’t any 
idea we went down to the Bay. How could he have ? 
He couldn’t have followed us.” 

“ Of course I can’t prove it to you, and it may 
288 


THE FINISH 


be all nonsense. But I haven’t been able to shake 
the idea that he was up to something when he didn’t 
come back with the rest of his crowd that night. 
Even if it does turn out to be foolishness, it won’t 
cost anybody anything but a little time to do as I ask. 
I’ve had hunches like this before, and they’ve always 
turned out to be good ones. If Crane hadn’t gone 
away I’d give it up and not say a word — but he’s 
gone 1 ” 

“ He’s gone home, of course ! ” 

“ I don’t think he has. He didn’t take any trunk 
with him, and he didn’t tell anybody he was going 
home.” 

“ Well, he wouldn’t go down to our place on the 
Bay — I know that. It would be too risky. He 
knows that if I don’t pass this exam I’ll be going 
down there myself. I told him that only yesterday.” 

But Bill made still another argument out of that. 

“ That’s why he’s gone now, instead of waiting 
till to-morrow,” he argued patiently. 

“ You’d make something out of nothing if you 
couldn’t find anything else,” grumbled Sands. 
“ What is it you want me to do? ” 

“ Just go down there and make sure everything 
is safe.” 

Sands looked at him as if he were beyond hope. 

“ Just go down there? Why, man alive, I’ve got 
to spend fourteen hours. out of every twelve plugging 
289 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


on this exam. Do you suppose I’m going to give up 
my last chance to go on a Glee Club trip while 
there’s any chance left at all? ” 

“ Then let me or somebody else go.” 

“ Oh, you can do any crazy thing you want to. 
Here’s the keys to the place and I’ll give you a cer- 
tificate of character, ’phone home to mother to send 
someone down to open the place up, or anything. 
Only don’t expect me to stir from this room till that 
exam is over, except to obtain nourishment.” 

So it was arranged, and Sands spent a precious 
twenty minutes telephoning to his mother, for he was 
a hospitable person and he wanted the house to be 
habitable when Bill got there. It would have to be 
made so in a week or two, anyway. The twenty min- 
utes of telephoning lengthened itself into twenty 
more, however, and Sands was seething with excite- 
ment when it was over. The next half hour he spent 
sending telegrams and giving directions to Bill. 

“ You leave on this next car, and you’ll get to the 
Bay by five o’clock. What do you think ? That man 
Crane has bamboozled mother with some tale about 
my sending him down there for the class because I 
was just leaving on the Glee Club trip, and she’s 
given him the keys and sent William along to help 
him! He’s got the finest nerve of anyone I know. 
Now I’ve fixed it up this way. Mother is going to get 
busy and get word to William somehow — William 
290 


THE FINISH 


is our chauffeur — so you’ll find him ready to help 
you, and I’ve telephoned to old Johnson, who’s the 
town constable down there. I think Bobby Crane will 
find he’s in quite a mess. By George, I’ve half a mind 
to chuck the whole business and go down myself! ” 

But he didn’t. Bill went alone, and arrived at 
the Bay late in the afternoon to find William and old 
Johnson in possession, with Crane imprisoned in the 
kitchen, smoking a cigarette. 

“ Old Slouch, as I live and breathe I ” he ex- 
claimed as Bill entered. “ And I dared to think I 
could outwit you 1 ” 

“ Are you Mister Bill? ” inquired Mr. Johnson, 
who was not aged at all, but a very able-bodied town 
constable. 

“ Here are my credentials from Phil Sands,” said 
Bill, handing over the letter Phil had given him. 

Mr. Johnson read it carefully. 

“ Well, what do you want I should do with this 
feller? ” pointing to Crane. 

“ If you can just see that he stays right here for 
a while, until we get things fixed up, I guess it will be 
all right.” 

“ Oh, I’ll see to that, all right. Right here he’ll 
stay till you give the word.” 

Crane took out another cigarette and lighted it. 

“ I suppose you know you are making yourself 
liable to a good deal of trouble by keeping me here 
291 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


if I happen to want to leave, don’t you, Mr. John- 
son?” he asked quietly. 

“ Now don’t you talk to me about getting into 
trouble, young man! If young Mister Sands wa’n’t 
minded to let you off easy you’d be liable to go to 
jail for bein’ an uncommon slick house thief.” 

“ Oh, very well. But remember, I warned you,” 
Crane remarked calmly. “ So the fair Sabrina is 
really here, is she? ” he added to Bill. “ I thought 
so, but I wasn’t sure till the stalwart William here 
informed me that I wasn’t to stir out of this kitchen 
till you arrived. I might have known ‘Old Slouch’ 
would be on the job somewhere. What are you 
going to do? ” 

“Got another cigarette?” asked Bill, sitting 
down on the edge of a table. 

“ Sure.” Crane handed him his cigarette case. 

“ I’m going to let you have a look at Sabrina,” 
Bill said, striking a match. “ I think it’s coming to 
you after all this trouble.” 

“ You are too kind! ” murmured Crane. 

“ I’m going to ask you to help us unbury her, if 
you will. And then I’m going to take her away, and 
after I’ve been gone about ten or twelve hours Mr. 
Johnson will let you go, too.” 

Crane blew out a cloud of smoke and peered at 
Bill through it, biting his underlip meditatively. 
Then he stood up abruptly. 

292 


THE FINISH 


“ All right: let’s get busy,” he said. 

Bill led the way down cellar and the attack on 
the woodpile began. It took only a little while to 
pull it down, and for the second time in many years 
Sabrina was revealed to the eyes of those who were 
not her followers. 

“ I hope you won’t mind very much, Bobby, but 
I wish you’d go upstairs again now,” said Bill. 
“ There’s a little ceremony going to take place down 
here, and I’m sorry, but you haven’t any right to 
see it.” 

“ Far be it from me,” Crane rejoined cheer- 
fullyj and started up the stairs with Mr. Johnson at 
his heels. 

The next hour was spent in packing the statue. 
Darkness had come when it was finished, and Bill 
went upstairs again. 

“Everything settled?” inquired Crane. 

“ Everything, and I’m going to leave you in Mr. 
Johnson’s loving care. He’ll see that you get the 
five o’clock train for Boston to-morrow afternoon. 
Good-by,” and he held out his hand. “ Do you 
know, Bobby, I’m sorry you’re not a Sabrina man — 
you’d make such a good one.” 

Crane shook the offered hand and smiled. 

“ I’m rather sorry you are a Sabrina man,” he 
replied. “ If you weren’t. I’d probably be one my- 
self by now — but there are lots of times coming. I 
20 293 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 

don’t wish you very much hard luck, but I hope you 
get caught.” 

And so Bill left him. 

The Easter vacation and the Easter trip were 
over. Sands passed his exam after all, so he and 
Colchester and Tod Smith had their last trip to- 
gether; and because it was their last trip and they 
were seniors they acted worse than freshmen and 
had a fine time of it. Now it was over, they did not 
go directly back to Tresham, but went to New York 
instead, for another last fine time. 

Bill and Butt went to New York, too, for the 
same purpose, only with them it was to be the first 
fine time. There they stayed in hiding, with a mys- 
terious-looking box concealed in their closet, waiting 
for the night of the day when college should open 
again. 

When that night came there were a great many 
other Tresham men in town, for Herbie Nichols had 
not been posted as to certain plans this time, and they 
worked without a hitch. 

Late in the afternoon the mysterious box, and 
Bill, Butt and Colchester with it, left a certain hotel 
by way of a side door, an alleyway, and a large, 
covered moving van. It took over two hours for 
this van to make its journey, which lay through many 
side streets and crowded thoroughfares and ended at 
294 


THE FINISH 


another hotel, not ten minutes’ walk from the one 
where it had started. All this was to throw anyone 
who might be on the look-out off the track. Whether 
the driver of the van was exceptionally good at his 
job, or there was no one on the look-out, the journey 
was completed in safety and the box was delivered 
into a small room adjoining a large room, in which 
many tables were laid for eating. 

It was in this room that the many men from 
Tresham gathered, and sat them down to feast. At 
the center of the longest table sat Robert B. Chanler, 
the toastmaster of the evening. Among those who 
sat at another table, round, not long, were Wilbur 
Durham, 2d, Thomas Jefferson Gray, John Haw- 
kins, John Michael McCarthy and Ridgeway Bill, 
Jr. Those about still another table included Mere- 
dith, Tod Smith, Sands and Colchester. And there 
were a hundred others just as important and having 
just as good a time. 

It was a most joyful occasion, with most appetiz- 
ing things to eat. The soup had already been dis- 
posed of, and the fish, though that which had been 
placed before Meredith and Colchester was still un- 
touched, for they had suddenly and mysteriously van- 
ished. Once more the empty plates were taken away, 
but when the door opened again there appeared, not 
more food, but Sabrina, the heroine of the feast, 
borne by Colchester and Meredith. Slowly they 
29s 


THE NEW SOPHOMORE 


brought her in, while the chandeliers rattled with the 
cheer that rose to welcome her. The cheer died 
away as they set her down in the center of the room, 
and for a minute there was silence as another even- 
year class gazed on its goddess. 

Bill stood looking over Gray’s shoulder. It 
seemed to him there was an air almost pathetic in 
that sitting figure, as if she were mutely appealing to 
them for something, and again he felt that inward 
surge of loyalty that had welled up within him when 
he first saw her in the firelight down in that silent 
house by the ocean. 

He was wondering if the others were feeling the 
same way, when he suddenly heard Butt rapping 
loudly on the table to attract attention. 

“ Before we go through the ceremony that is 
always gone through at this time,” he began, raising 
his voice so that everyone in the room might hear, 
“ I want to tell you something that most of you don’t 
know. Just a month ago to-day Sabrina appeared 
in Tresham for the first time in more years than any 
of us can tell. You all saw her, just for a minute, 
and many others saw her who will never see her 
again. You know what happened afterwards, and 
that she was safely taken away and hidden again. 
But she was not so safe as we thought. We did not 
know it, but one of the juniors found her hiding 
place, and we should not be having this banquet to- 
296 


THE FINISH 


night if it were not for one man. That is Ridge Bill, 
who saved her for us. Billy, come over here ! ” 

A whole-hearted shout burst forth as those be- 
hind him pushed Bill forward, till he stood at Butt’s 
side. He was grinning happily, but the choky feel- 
ing in his throat had grown and he would have found 
it hard to speak. He looked down at Butt, who laid 
one hand on his shoulder and went on with his 
speech. 

“ Perhaps we can get him to tell us all about it 
later, but first we must salute our goddess. Every- 
body get in line, and — what do you say, fellows ? — 
Bill shall lead us!” 

“ Lead on! Lead on! ” they cried, falling in be- 
hind him. And singing their oft-sung battle chant 
— to-night a song of praise — the long line began 
slowly moving forward to pay to the goddess her 
accustomed homage. 


( 1 ) 


THE END 








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of the fame of the gallant young author, but because it is a splendid 
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reading extends far into the small morning hours.” 

—Albany Times ’■Union. 

“American boys who take an interest in the growth and achieve- 
ments of our splendid Navy— and that means all American boys with 
red blood in their veins — ^have a huge treat awaiting them in ‘ Buck 
Jones at Annapolis.’ The book is full of snap, stirring adventure and 
insight into life at Annapolis .” — Army and Navy Journal. 


D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 


BY ROBERT W. CHAMBERS. 


CHILDREN'S BOOKS. 
Garden-Land. 

Mountain-Land. 

Forest-Land. 

Uniform style. Each with a pictorial cover 
and eight full-page Illustrations and many 
Sketches. Each $1.50 net; postage additional. 

A charming series of stories relating the adven- 
tures of a little boy and girl, Peter and Geraldine, 
out in the garden, in the forest and 'way up on a 
big mountain. They learn the strange secrets of 
all kinds of wild things from a tiny butterfly to a 
Canada Lynx. The animals and insects they meet 
tell them lots of interesting things about nature 
and the wild life of the mountain, forest and garden. 
The Voice of the Forest” whispers to them and 
even the big mountain itself speaks to them. The 
stories fill the reader, be he young or old, with a 
feeling of the fresh outdoors, healthy, kindly, happy 
thoughts, and pure ideas. The illustrations in color 
by prominent artists add much to the attractiveness 
of the volumes. 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 


HISTORIC LIVES SERIES. 


A series of popular biographies dealing with famous men 
of all times and countries, written in brief form and repre- 
senting the latest knowledge on the subjects, each illus- 
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chosen for their special knowledge of the subjects. 


Each i2mo. Illustrated, Cloth, $z.oo net. 

Postage, lo cents additional. 

NO W READ Y. 

Father Marquette, the Explorer of the Mississippi. 

By Reuben Gold Thwaites, Editor of “The Jesuit 
Relations,” etc. 

Daniel Boone. 

By Reuben Gold Thwaites, Editor of “The Jesuit 
Relations,” “ Father Marquette,” etc. 

Horace Greeley. 

By William A. Linn, Author of “The Story of the 
Mormons.” 

Sir William Johnson. 

By Augustus C. Buell, Author of “ Paul Jones, 
Founder of the American Navy.” 

Anthony Wayne. 

By John R. Spears. 

Champlain: The Founder of New France. 

By Edwin Asa Dix, M.A., LL.D., Formerly Fellow in 
History in Princeton University ; Author of “ Deacon Brad- 
bury,” “ A Midsummer Drive through the Pyrenees,” etc. 

James Oglethorpe : The Founder of Georgia. 

By Harriet C. Cooper. 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK, 


BY HEZEKIAH BUTTERWORTR 


The Young; McKinley. 

inustratedT i2mo. Ornamental Cloth, $1.50. 

Mr. Butterworth portrays the future President at school, where, after a bitter dis- 
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exterior, says to him : “ Never mind, you may be President yet.” He traces President 
McKinley’s career through his army days to the time when he was preparing for that 
great political career which made the blow that struck him down at the height of his 
glory a blow to the whole United States. 

Brother Jonathan; or, The Alarm Post in the Cedars. 

A Tale of Early Connecticut. Illustrated. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 

In the Days of Audubon. 

Al Tale of the “ Protector of Birds.’* Illustrated by B. West Clinedinst 
and others. i2mo. Cloth, $1.50. 

In the Days of Jefferson; or, The Six Golden Horseshoes. 

A Tale of Republican Simplicity. Illustrated by F. T. Merrill. $1.50. 

The Story of Magellan. 

A Tale of the Discovery of the Philippines. Illustrated by F. T. Merrill 
and others. $1.50. 

The Treasure Ship). 

A Story of Sir William Phipps and the Inter-Charter Period in Massa* 
chusetts. Illustrated by B. West Clinedinst and others. $1.50. 

The Pilot of the Mayflower. 

Illustrated by H. Winthrop Peirce and others. $1.50. 

True to His Home. 

A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin. Illustrated by H. Winthrop Peirce. 

$1.50. 

The Wampum Belt; or. The Fairest Page of History. 

A Tale of William Penn’s Treaty with the Indians. With 6 full-pagp 
Illustrations. $1.50. 

The Knight of Liberty. 

A Tale of the Fortunes of Lafayette. With 6 full-page Illustrations. $1.50. 

The Patriot Schoolmaster. 

A Tale of the Minutemen and the Sons of Liberty, With 6 full-page 
Illustrations by H. Winthrop Peirce. $1.50. 

In the Boyhood of Lincoln. 

A Story of the Black Hawk War and the Tunker Schoolmaster. Witn 
S3 Illustrations and colored Frontispiece. $1.50. 

The Boys of Green way Court. 

A Story of the Early Years of Washington. With xo full-page Illustra- 
tions. $1.50. 

The Log School-House on the Columbia. 

With 13 full-page Illustrations by J. Carter Beard, E. J. Austen, and 
others. $1.50. 

D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 


STORIES FOR YOUNG READERS 


JOURNEYS OF THE KIT KAT CLUB. Illus- 
trated. 8 VO. $2.00 Net. 

By William R. A. Wilson. 

A beautifully illustrated volume filled with interesting and salient 
features of English history, folk-lore, politics, and scenery. 

BUTT CHANLER, FRESHMAN. Illustrated. 

1 2 mo. Si.JO. 

By James Shelley Hamilton, Amherst *o 6 . 

College sports are always a subject of interest to young readers, 
and here are incidents that are dear to all college associates. 

“The story is breezy, bright, and clean .” — The Bookseller, New 
York. 

WILLIAMS OF WEST POINT. Illustrated. i2mo. 
$1.50. 

By Lieut. Hugh S. Johnson. 

A story of West Point under the old code. “ Every boy with 
red Iplood in his veins will pronounce it a corker .” — The Globe, 
Boston. 

THE SUBSTITUTE. Illustrated. i2mo. $1.^0. 

By Walter Camp. 

“Presents the ideal to football enthusiasts. The author’s name 
is guarantee of the accuracy of descri aions of the plays .” — The 
Courant, Hartford, Conn. 

THE FOREST RUNNERS. Illustrated in Color. 
i2mo. $1.50. 

By Joseph A. Altsheler. 

This story deals with the further adventures of the two young 
woodsmen in the history of Kentucky who were heroes in “ The 
Young Trailers.” The story is full of thrills to appeal to every boy 
who loves a good story. 


D. APPLETON AND COMPANY, NEW YORK. 




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